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This Week in Bioethics

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1. Hippocratic Telemedicine? Perhaps, like me, you have received emails from your health insurance company or seen ads on your social media letting you know about options that will allow you to “see” a health care provider by phone, email, webcam, or even text. According to the Wall Street Journal, if you haven’t received such […]

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The Cold Chain of Precious Cargo

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Wired has just published a close look at the global cold chain of eggs, sperm, and embryos headed to the latest destination where paid surrogacy is legal: “Inside the Hidden Global Supply Chain for Frozen Sperm, Eggs, and Embryos.” Typically, a cold chain is the transportation of things that have a limited shelf-life. Think food […]

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Father of The Pill, Always the Provocateur

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Carl Djerassi, at 91, is still making predictions about the future of sex, baby making, and abortion. In his usual fashion, he’s making waves. Known mostly for his work developing the oral contraceptive birth control pill in the early 1950s, he’s now predicting that abortions will become obsolete because people will opt for sterilization, making […]

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More New York Times Coverage of Surrogacy, Breeders?

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The New York Times today published the third and final installment in a series of articles on surrogacy. This article appears on the front page and is titled, “Surrogates and Couples Face a Maze of Laws, State by State.” Weighing the Risks One of the strongest opponents of surrogacy is Jennifer Lahl, president of the […]

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Jennifer Lahl and Breeders? Featured on ABC’s Nightline

The ABC News program Nightline last night examined the practice of surrogacy, prominently featuring Jennifer Lahl, our film Breeders: A Subclass of Women?, as well as Tanya and Jessica from the film in their coverage. The video is embedded below, or you can watch it and read a transcript on the ABC News website. ABC […]

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What We’re Reading

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Here’s a sampling of news and opinion items the CBC staff has been reading recently. ABC Australia, “Breaking the Code: Donor-Conceived Children Search for Identity of Fathers and their Biological Heritage” When you go to see your doctor, you assume that he or she will keep an accurate record of that consultation. But that is […]

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Artificial Wombs, Real Consequences

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The recent report by transhumanist Zoltan Istvan that scientists are well on their way to successfully creating artificial wombs has caused a stir in a number of circles. Ectogenesis, the scientific name for the process, was once merely a product of fiction. For most of us, however, the reality of artificial wombs is something we […]

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Egg Freezing’s False Promises

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Today’s New York Post features an article highlighting a new low in the exploitation of women: egg-freezing parties. Sponsored by EggBanxx, the event targeted young professional women in Manhattan encouraging them to freeze their eggs as a means to free them to pursue their careers and wait until they find Mr. Right to have children. […]

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What’s Wrong with Third Party Assisted Reproduction?

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Here is a new resource we’ve developed in order to highlight and provide references to medical and scientific literature on issues that arise in third-party reproduction. The information is divided into three sections that address: Health and psychological risks to women serving as egg vendors or surrogates Health and psychological risks to the children born […]

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Babies are Children, not “Carbon Legacies!”

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I guess it takes global warming hysteria to get the bioethics movement to criticize what is known in the trade as “artificial reproductive technologies” or ART. But now, in the ever more radical Journal of Medical Ethics, Cristina Richie, of Boston College’s Department of Theology, argues that these technologies should be regulated to limit the number […]

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A Bad Week of Press for Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART)

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If you are like me (you probably aren’t) and have your google alerts set for “egg donation,” “sperm donation,” and “surrogacy,” you will have seen that it was a bad press week for the field of reproductive medicine. Here are several stories that caught my eye. Risks to Mother and ChildThe Daily Mail reports on […]

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Fertility Industry Dehumanizes Surrogates

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As a paid consultant for the Center for Bioethics and Culture, I have become informed about issues to which I might otherwise have paid scant attention. This is particularly true with regard to the increasingly dark side of the fertility industry, about which the CBC has been doing splendidly illuminative work. It has really opened […]

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In Vitro Fantasies

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Yesterday the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology announced that IVF birth rates reached an all time high in 2012, accounting for 1.5% of all births in the United States. Incidentally, this news reached me just a few hours after I completed an interview with a woman who went down the path of several failed IVF cycles […]

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Why that Film Affected Me So

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A woman who just watched Breeders sent the following note: How utterly profound, sad, and revealing. I actually cried at the end of that film and I am the *antithesis* of a weeper! And I sat, somewhat stunned, in silence for about 15 minutes when the film ended — thoroughly disturbed by what I had […]

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Alana S. Newman: Shark Tank Girl

When I first met Alana, I was at Columbia University Law School screening my documentary film, Eggsploitation. I had done an earlier screening during the day at Fordham University Law School and noted at both of these screenings “they” were following me. They being the women who typically attend my screenings to give me pushback […]

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Egg Harvesting Raises Risk of Ovarian Tumors

By Wesley J. Smith, J.D., Special Consultant to the CBC IVF has been painted as a virtually risk free enterprise. But we haven’t much studied the long term impact on children — who appear to have higher rates of certain health issues than those conceived through the natural process — or on women who have […]

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Father Can’t Stop Embryos From Being Implanted

By Wesley J. Smith, J.D., Special Consultant to the CBC It amazes me how an embryo is or isn’t an existing human life — depending on what the question is. In Argentina, a man fathered embryos via IVF, and then divorced. His ex wants to be implanted with the embryos, but he says that would […]

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CBC is Just Getting Started

Your personal interest in what is happening through the Center for Bioethics and Culture (CBC) is so encouraging. I appreciate your willingness to join hands with me in this bioethics battle. I cannot lead this effort without you! On September 3, I returned home from a packed 12-day trip to Italy. Eggsploitation was one of […]

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