IVF and Artificial Reproductive Technologies

 The birth of Louise Brown in 1978 marked a profound change in the history of human reproduction.  For the first time a human being was born whose conception had taken place outside the womb.  It is hard to overstate the importance of this event for the entire global debate on bioethics (this is the branch of ethics that addresses questions to do with our treatment of individual human beings). 

 Many people reacted instinctively against IVF, not always for very good reasons.  A common objection at the time were that the technology was in some sense “unnatural” or that it was “playing God” by bypassing normal sexual reproduction.  By themselves, these are not particularly convincing critiques.  However, conception outside the womb does raise substantial and profound ethical dilemmas.

 Many people are not even aware that there are moral objections to IVF.  Even many of those who oppose abortion do not object to IVF, perhaps because it is seen as generating life rather than taking it.  This is true to some extent.  There are certainly people alive today who would never have been conceived were it not for in vitro fertilisation, and each one of these people, like every other human being, is uniquely valuable.  Yet IVF, as a process, is inherently wasteful of human life.  This does not mean that we think that those born following IVF have any less value or significance.  It does not follow that simply because we feel that a person was conceived by an unethical method we do not value them.  We do not, for instance, hold this attitude to those born as a result of rape.

 At the heart of all these debates is the question of the moral status of the human embryo.  Unless we engage with this question, we are not having a full and proper debate.  LIFE believes that, as a unique individual, the human embryo ought not to be discarded, manipulated or used for experimentation, nor should it be treated as a means to an end, however desirable or noble that end.