The recent move by Alabama that criminalizes abortions from the moment of conception brings troubling concerns in many areas, including assisted reproduction, even for those who want to gestate a child.
The Alabama law bans all abortions, including in cases of rape or incest, except when there is a serious health risk to the pregnant person. Doctors who perform one (or even try to) will be charged with a felony and up to 99 years in prison. Georgia, Mississippi, and Ohio have also enacted similar legislation (though not quite as restrictive); so have North Dakota, Arkansas, Iowa, and Kentucky, although judges have blocked the latter four, for the moment. Missouri is also advancing a bill nearly as restrictive as Alabama’s, differing only in that it would be banned after eight weeks of pregnancy. The end game for many who pushed for these bills is to have them challenged up to the U.S. Supreme Court, triggering a decision that would ban abortion nationwide.
This is hugely scary for anyone who can get pregnant, especially when it is the result of non-consensual sex. It is a queer issue as well as a non-queer one because many of us can of course become pregnant or have family and friends who can. Additionally, such laws could have a negative impact on assisted reproduction, used by many (myself included) within and outside the queer community. Here’s why.
The Alabama bill defines an “unborn child, child or person” as “A human being, specifically including an unborn child in utero at any stage of development, regardless of viability.” Resolve: the National Infertility Association explains on its website that such “personhood legislation” may mean that “anything that puts an embryo at risk could be a violation of law.” This leads to a number of worrying questions, they explain, including:
- Could the physician, lab, or patient be liable if one or more embryos from an IVF cycle do not develop normally in the lab or do not result in live births?
- Would clinics who perform assisted inseminations—or their patients—be at risk of criminal charges because such inseminations carry a higher risk of miscarriage than insemination via intercourse?
- Who will have legal responsibility for fertilized eggs that were not transferred to a uterus, and could people lose the rights of disposition over their embryos?
- Could embryo freezing be prohibited as too risky, since not all embryos thaw well?
- If so, what would happen to women who experience hyper-stimulation during an IVF cycle and for whom the medical recommendation is to freeze and not transfer the embryos right away? Would they have to transfer the embryos anyway?
- May someone who lives in a state with personhood laws travel to other states for IVF, or would their embryos remain bound by their home state’s laws?
- Would they be able to move currently frozen embryos to another state to continue treatment? Even if they could, what if they cannot afford to live in another state during treatment?
These are open questions—worrying for the future, certainly, but also unsettled questions of law. Don’t panic that they are actually transpiring—just act now to make sure that they don’t. Keep in mind that, as Rewire.News reminds us, people may still access abortions in every state at the current time, since none of these bills have yet gone into effect. (Even those that have been signed into law and not blocked by a court do not go into effect right away.) That means these bills’ impact on IVF is also nil, for the moment. Still, the threat is real.
A few organizations that are working for reproductive justice and are worth following include:
- The ACLU, which announced yesterday that it is suing Ohio over its ban. You can pledge to help them here.
- Planned Parenthood, also suing the Trump administration and taking action elsewhere to support reproductive rights.
- SPARK Reproductive Justice NOW, which works on reproductive rights in Georgia and the South, centering Black women, women of color and Queer/Trans Young People of color.
- The Southeastern Alliance for Reproductive Equity, which brings together a number of organizations working to build equity and systemic change in reproductive health.
No matter our gender, sexual orientation, or current or desired parental status, the anti-abortion bills will impact us and our loved ones in some way, shape, or form. Reproductive rights are queer rights, and we must work alongside other equity-minded people of all orientations and identities towards reproductive justice for all.
