Republicans Are Selling “Ethical IVF.” It’s a Scam.

The problem, argue the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, is that RRM assumes that the same treatments will work for everyone—and that RRM will stigmatize IVF as unethical and ripe for regulation or prohibition (RRM is sometimes marketed quite literally as “ethical IVF”). ACOG, for example, argues that RRM can “expose patients to needless, painful surgical interventions; limit their access to the full range of evidence-based fertility care interventions; and delay time to pregnancy, while potentially increasing overall costs.” What’s more, RRM tends to focus on female-factor infertility, which accounts for only about a third of the issues facing those trying to conceive (about a third of cases involve male-factor infertility, and about a third involve both gamete donors or undetermined causes). It appeals to both MAHA and the Christian Right by assigning responsibility for infertility to women, assuming that families should involve a married heterosexual couple, and suggesting that families have been denied information about their bodies and fertility by a greedy industry that sounds strikingly like what abortion opponents for years have called “Big Abortion.” The tagline some Republican members of Congress have used for RRM even echoes a long-standing anti-abortion talking point: Women deserve better.

Author: Mary Ziegler

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