Where the Embryos Go: IVF Patients Want to Support Research

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http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2007/06/ivf.html

Where the Embryos Go: IVF Patients Want to Support Research

June 21, 2007

It’s well known that the public strongly supports embryonic stem cell research Less attention has been paid to the opinions of the couples actually making decisions about what to do with excess embryos. In the wake of the president’s veto of lesgislation that would have helped to further stem cell research, a new study suggests that a large majority of couples want to donate their excess embryos to research. Unfortunately, President Bush has decided that those couples don’t have a choice in the matter.

When a couple undergoes in vitro fertilization, they frequently end up with excess embryos that are not needed for the treatment. The couple has a number of options regarding what do to with those embryos, including donating them to research, destroying them, storing them indefinitely, or donating them to other infertile couples.

Researchers at Duke University and Johns Hopkins University reported in a study released this week that 62 percent of couples with embryos preserved for IVF treatments would readily donate them to stem cell research. The researchers also found that only 22 percent of couples would donate their embryos to another infertile couple, challenging the Bush administration’s support for this option as an alternative use of excess embryos.

The authors of the study suggest that embryos donated from fertility treatment clinics could provide several thousand more cell lines for research—100 times the number of lines currently available for federal funding. Rather than see those embryos discarded as medical waste, many couples want them to be used for potentially life-saving research.

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