My spouse and I started our family via reciprocal in vitro fertilization (IVF). The overturning of Roe v. Wade, however, poses a threat to IVF access and to others who want to start their families through IVF. While IVF remains legal in every state as of this writing, a new campaign is seeking to ensure it stays that way.
Fight for Families is a communications campaign launched by RESOLVE: The National Infertility Association. RESOLVE explains that ever since Dobbs, the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that overturned the national right to abortion, reproductive rights are in the hands of state lawmakers. “New legislation intended to restrict or ban abortion may include language that is unclear or specifically targets in-vitro embryos. That means fertility treatments like IVF could become inaccessible, unaffordable, and out of reach for those who need it.”
More specifically:
For more than a decade, states have attempted to pass laws declaring that human life, or “personhood,” begins as soon as sperm fertilizes an egg.
These so-called personhood bills could make common fertility treatments like IVF illegal, as an in-vitro embryo created but not implanted in a uterus would be considered to have all the rights of a person under the law.
RESOLVE is therefore tracking both pro- and anti-reproductive rights legislation. I hope you’ll take a look to see if there are bills in your state that you want to urge your elected officials, family, and friends to either support or oppose.
Children have been born successfully via IVF since 1978. IVF is a fundamental technique of fertility care both for LGBTQ people and for many others. This is one of the many reasons we need to keep pushing back against the overturning of Roe.
It is counter to the freedoms that our country has long professed to restrict reproductive care because of the religious values of one segment of the community, while violating the religious freedoms of others. (For example, under Jewish law, abortion is permitted and even required if the pregnancy endangers the gestating person’s life.) As the old reproductive rights slogan goes, if you don’t believe in abortion, don’t have one. If you don’t want to pursue IVF, don’t. But don’t let your beliefs hinder others in following theirs.