On the topic of abortion and it being immoral due to killing an innocent life I believe we should discuss the moral implications of IVF. If pro-life, pro-birth, anti-abortionists want to stay consistent on when life becomes life we need to address IVF. We agree that human life has immeasurable value in all its forms, including the earliest stages beginning with fertilization. We also agree that embryos should not be carelessly treated or destroyed. However, in many IVF cases numerous embryos are made in order to have a higher chance of implantation and in this process embryos are either destroyed or frozen for an indefinite timeline.
24 out of 25 human beings conceived using IVF die. The IVF industry boasts a 40% rate "success" rate, but they consider it a "success" if one baby survives. IVF practitioners usually do 2 or 3 implantations of several humans each cycle, which brings down the survival rate to about 4% for each baby conceived.
Not to mention, they implant a number of tiny human beings into the womb. If too many succeed, they abort some of them by sticking a needle into their heart tissue. This is called "Reduction". IVF babies are being screened and selected based on sex and other characteristics: this is a form Eugenics.
If we are to stay consistent, we must also call out IVF practices.
Okay, so I saw this post screencapped on reddit and it was just so egregiously wrong that I had to come to tumblr which I haven't used for literal years just to explain why it's wrong.
My wife and I have been TTC since 2019. We did one round of IVF and are proceeding with FET using donated embryos. Because yeah, not all surplus embryos are discarded. A lot of them are donated to other families trying to conceive. There are agencies set up to facilitate this, a lot with kind of gross Christian overtones. Ours were donated to us by a couple we found through Facebook group of all places.
Secondly, a lot of embryo transfer cycles are unsuccessful. In natural conception, a lot of embryos simply don't make it to implantation. We know what IVF success rates are like because they're followed so closely, but there isn't really a good way of knowing how many embryos are created through natural conception never make it to implantation. And the embryo failure rate is probably even higher for IVF cases because couples that end up doing IVF often have poor egg or sperm quality issues that result in a lower level of viability.
Lastly, it is no longer standard procedure to transfer multiple embryos per cycle, precisely because it has a higher chance in resulting in multiple births.
This post is just gross and disrespectful to couples that are already facing a really difficult decision.
Go back to Reddit. Sources are linked in the comments as someone asked for them. More embryos are disregarded than they are adopted and given to other families because many families start IVF to have biological children. The recommended cycles to have a 65% success rate (which still varies based on age, health and size) is six, what happens to all those other embryos if the IVF fails? Which it does a majority of the time. Also, it is immoral to freeze a human being, a child isn’t a commodity and it’s heartbreaking that many loving couples struggle with infertility but that doesn’t give you and others the right to test subject embryos for the chance of having a wanted child. Although IVF has a 10-40% success rate (this varies on age, health, size, etc) each embryo has about a 96% chance of dying, and most couples utilize 8 embryos for the first cycle because the success rate may increase and many companies offer 8 embryos for the first cycle knowing that it is more financially secure for a couple to risk that money when they are told the success rate is higher with more embryos. Another issue here is that every failure means the deliberate death of a human being. Children born from IVF aren’t less than either btw but the practice and industry is not one to boast about and support- mostly when it comes to women’s health.
SPUC President Mgr Anthony Fisher notes:
“IVF is in fact not a very successful technology. The best programs report success rates of around 15% and this rate seems to have plateaued. Women can keep going back for cycle after cycle, but for most after a long series of highly intrusive procedures and a roller-coaster of emotions there will be no child at the end. Evidence of serious psychological ill-effects of these procedures is now emerging, especially for women whom these new biotechnologies fail. In the next generation we are likely to have a whole cohort of women suffering post-IVF trauma just as in our generation we have had so many suffering from post-abortion trauma. And yet again we can expect denial all round.”
Did you know that many women who believe they are infertile aren’t infertile at all and are actually struggling with an hormonal imbalance which creates irregular cycles or prevents a woman from ovulating and these issues can be solved through holistic methods. Before telling people to drop $12,000 dollars or more for the potential of a biological child, reproductive health should be more understood, researched and respected. Women should be taken more seriously in healthcare and listened to by OBs and Doctors. IVF is not the solution you think it is and making children a commodity is not the moral stance you should stand on.
*note to mention your last point that is why reduction is done, you are completely false saying it’s no standard procedure to transfer multiple embryos per cycle because now they utilize reduction in case multiple embryos are successful.
It is absolutely not standard to transfer multiple embryos. I have been to 3 different clinics, two of which are huge, multi-state systems. They will transfer at most two, and then only in cases when there have been multiple, unexplained losses. In the past, it was the norm to transfer more, but that categorically does not happen anymore without an actual medical reason.
By and large, I don't think I've ever met people with more reverence and awe at the human reproductive system than people who are going through IVF. People get emotionally attached to their embryos to an extent which seems really silly to outsiders. People refer to them as embabies. I truly didn't get it until I saw a picture of my own 3-day-old embryo-- literally just a handful of cells. People are not playing fast and loose with embryos, no matter what your pro-life propaganda says.
Please do not sit there and condescend to me about a subject in which you obviously have no firsthand experience. My blocked fallopian tube, diminished ovarian reserve, and uterus full of polyps are not going to be solved by holistic methods.
Also, an IVF failure is absolutely not the intentional death of a human being. Like, how dare you suggest that? My IVF cycle failed-- are you seriously suggesting that I did something deliberate to stop my deeply wanted embryo from implanting?
Lastly, REIs and their nursing staff are some of the most caring medical practicioners I have ever encountered. I have never felt not listened to or ignored. Every single last one I've ever met has fielded phone calls and messages at all hours of the day and night, and answered any questions I have had, no matter how silly they are.
Again not true. Refer to the sources I linked and I’ve known multiple families who have tried to go through IVF. It is indeed the standard and having less than two embryos is not the norm. I’ve already discussed everything you have stated before and so do all the papers and articles and stories I’ve linked. And your experience with the healthcare system is not the norm so please don’t try to invalidate all the women who have traumatic birthing experiences and go through our healthcare system only to be neglected. It’s not just birth either, it can how women are treated due to endometriosis, or how women are prescribed a pill to put a bandaid over an issue caused by hormonal imbalance or the lack of knowledge the healthcare system has overall pertaining to women’s health. I said what I said and I’m not repeating myself and if you take issue with the facts of IVF that’s on you.
I think that, for whatever reason, you are conflating the number of embryos generated in an egg retrieval cycle with the number of embryos transferred in a FET cycle. You are correct in that 5-8 embryos being created in an ER cycle is pretty average. The doctors do not transfer all of them in FET, however.
I read through your sources, and not a single one talked about the current guidelines on the number of embryos to transfer at a time.. I did some more reading of my own, and what I discovered is that single embryo transfer is considered the gold standard, with better outcomes across the board. Some doctors will transfer more, usually upon patient request. In my experience, providers are very hesitant to do more than one embryo transfer at a time. My current provider told us unequivocally that he will only do one embryo transfer at a time. My last doctor will do two, but only if you twist his arm, and I think you might need to sign some sort of informed consent. Transferring more than one embryo just isn't evidence-based care, and I would not trust a provider who routinely did more than one.
I was almost hoping that you'd bring up endometriosis. I thought exactly the same thing that you did-- that birth control for endometriosis was just slapping a bandaid on the issue. I thought that up until I found out that I have the ovarian reserve of a woman ten years older, and that untreated endometriosis is probably the reason why. Hormonal birth control can help preserve fertility in people with endometriosis by reducing the number of menstrual events. I had spent the previous 10 years sometimes on but mostly off hormonal birth control because I didn't want to slap a bandaid on it. If I could do it all over again, I would have listened to my doctor.
Also, my experiences with healthcare aren't all positive. I've had some really negative experiences with gynecologists, just not with my REIs and their staff. My positive experiences don't invalidate other people's negative experiences. But when you've encountered a REI who takes time to pray with patients who need it, or who answer questions for 45 minutes, or who make decisions based on what's best for the embryos you have, it does challenge the assertion that they're all just in it for the money or that they don't have reverence for human life. These are genuinely good people, who genuinely want to help people become parents. If you spent 10 minutes talking to one, you would know that.
