Pending a final decision by the House of Lords, the UK is about to approve a procedure to produce “three parent” children via IVF (in vitro fertilization), but scientists aren’t waiting for the ink to dry on the new law and are already publishing ads looking for healthy young women who are willing to sell their eggs to science for the equivalent of $700.
The Catholic Herald is reporting that a new ad posted in a local newspaper by Newcastle University is looking for “fit, healthy women between the ages of 21-35 years old who are willing to donate their eggs. Donors will receive £500 compensation for a completed donation cycle”.
These eggs are needed for the method which involves the extraction of the genetic material from the ovum of a mother whose genes contain a mitochondria defect which could produce a child with a variety of illnesses ranging from muscle weakness to heart disease and even death. This genetic material is then inserted into an eviscerated healthy donor ovum before being fertilized by the father. This method is known as “three-parent IVF”.
But in order to achieve this, volunteers are needed to donate their eggs “so that we can use the healthy mitochondria and thus create a healthy pregnancy,” the ad says.
It goes on to promise that “any women coming forward to offer egg donation would be assessed and undergo a full debriefing of what any procedure would involve.”
These could be substantial. Harvesting of eggs carries the risk of Ovarian Hyperstimulation Syndrome, a condition that strikes about 500 donors a year in the UK, of which 60 cases are considered severe.
“Women’s health is wantonly and dangerously placed at risk by hyper-ovulation,” said Lord Alton of Liverpool. “In addition, one of the procedures involves the destruction of the human embryos fertilized by the eggs.”
He added: “The enticing of women, who may well be unaware of the risks, and who may be in dire financial straits, with offers of substantial sums of money, only adds to the reasons why the House of Lords should insist that this is given further consideration.”
The House of Lords has yet to weigh in on the new procedure, which passed last week in Parliament by a vote of 328-128. It is scheduled to take up the procedure on February 24 as well as a motion to suspend implementation of the new law until further research is undertaken to determine the safety of the procedure and the impact it will have on offspring.
If the procedure passes in the House of Lords, it will be a first for the world. The European Union prohibits the practice and it has been questioned by the US Food and Drug Administration which stated that the “full spectrum of risks … has yet to be identified”.
Even though an unfertilized egg is not considered a human, the Church condemns the donation of eggs which are used to provide material for the “manufacturing” of embryos.
As the Catechism states: “Techniques that entail the dissociation of husband and wife, by the intrusion of a person other than the couple (donation of sperm or ovum, surrogate uterus), are gravely immoral. These techniques (heterologous artificial insemination and fertilization) infringe the child’s right to be born of a father and mother known to him and bound to each other by marriage. They betray the spouses’ “right to become a father and a mother only through each other” (No. 2376).
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