For the first time since the Bush-era stem cell debates, reproductive technology has taken center stage in American politics. An Alabama Supreme Court decision in February granted parents the right to legal recourse after their embryos were destroyed due to neglect by a fertility clinic, sparking a national debate about the laws governing in vitro fertilization, the technology used to create the embryos.
Taken together, the fight over these legal efforts may seem like a petty matter. Why should policymakers oppose the creation of children, especially when so many infertile people want to become parents? But the stakes are high. IVF and other reproductive technologies enable the creation and manipulation of human life itself. Such technologies should receive the highest level of scrutiny and not be left to the self-regulation of a financially driven industry.
The current consumer model of IVF regulation, in the absence of strong ethical boundaries, is a troubling precedent for emerging reproductive technologies that will likely arrive in the coming decades. In vitro gametogenesis is a novel procedure in which scientists reprogram any cell into viable egg or sperm, allowing any single individual or any group of individuals to become genetic “parents” of a child. In 2016, Japanese researchers made history by conceiving mice from genetically modified skin cells. Experts estimate that the procedure may become available for human use within ten to twenty years.
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