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Human Reproduction

  • Hastings Center News

    Watch the Livestream Tonight: Ethics of Technology Keynote Lecture by Hastings Center’s Josephine Johnston

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    Hastings Center News
    The Hastings Center’s director of research Josephine Johnston will explore how parental responsibilities are challenged by new genetic technologies in the keynote address of the “Ethics of Technology,” a yearlong lecture series at Washington & Lee University that begins on September 26.
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  • Hastings Center News

    Does Genetic Testing Pose Psychosocial Risks?

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    Hastings Center News
    For the last quarter century, researchers have been asking whether genetic information might have negative psychosocial effects. Anxiety, depression, disrupted relationships, and heightened stigmatization have all been posited as possible outcomes—but not consistently found. What accounts for the ...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    What’s Wrong with a Fertility Doctor Using His Own Sperm?

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    It was unethical for a fertility doctor to use his own sperm to inseminate patients without their consent. But what are the legal harms to the women? To their children?
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Moratorium on Human Genome Editing: Time to Get It Right

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Last month, the journal Nature published a call for a global moratorium on heritable human genome editing. Despite criticism, notably from CRISPR pioneer Jennifer Doudna, the moratorium is just what's needed now.
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Chinese Bioethicists Respond to the Case of He Jiankui

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    A preliminary investigation by Guangdong Province in China of He Jiankui, the scientist who created the world’s first gene-edited babies, found that “He had intentionally dodged supervision, raised funds and organized researchers on his own to carry out the human embryo gene-editing intended for ...
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  • Hastings Center News

    The Hastings Center Celebrates Outstanding Journalists

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    Hastings Center News
    Three journalists received The Hastings Center Awards for Excellence in Journalism on Ethics and Reprogenetics. The awards were presented at an event in New York City on December 6 that celebrated the role of journalists in helping the public understand the science of heredity and the power of geneti...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    He Jiankui: A Sorry Tale of High-Stakes Science

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    In response to news of the world’s first babies born in China from gene-edited embryos, Sam Sternberg, a CRISPR/Cas9 researcher at Columbia University, spoke for many when he said “I’ve long suspected that scientists, somewhere, would rush to claim the ‘prize’ of being first to apply CRISPR...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    He Jiankui’s Genetic Misadventure: Why Him? Why China?

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    The birth of gene-edited twin girls was announced by a young Chinese scientist He Jiankui through one of four self-made promotional videos in English on YouTube (a website officially banned in China) on November 25. Three days later, at the Second International Summit on Human Genome Editing held in ...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Should We Edit the Human Germline? Is Consensus Possible or Even Desirable?

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    I started writing this on my way back to New York from the Second International Summit on Human Genome Editing, held in Hong Kong November 27 to 29, where the breaking news of the alleged world’s first birth of genetically edited babies loomed large. The surprising news both reinforced and undercut...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Wrongful Death Suits for Frozen Embryos: A Bad Idea

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Last March, 4,000 frozen eggs and embryos were lost at University Hospitals Fertility Center in Cleveland when the temperature in cryogenic tanks spiked due to human error. Officials at University Hospitals have apologized repeatedly to the affected patients, and say that they are working to provide ...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Lena Dunham’s Lesson for Doctors

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    In a recent essay in Vogue the actress, writer, and director Lena Dunham described her decision to have a hysterectomy at age 31 after a decade of unsuccessful attempts to control increasingly excruciating pain from endometriosis. The decision was difficult because it meant that she would never be ab...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Reproductive Freedom: The More Things Change . . .

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    An opinion piece in the New York Times, “Doctors Fail Women Who Don’t Want Children,” serves as a striking reminder that the more things seem to change, the more they stay the same.
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Breastfeeding and Transgender Women

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    A transgender woman has successfully breastfed a baby. This case has been hailed as a “breakthrough” for transgender families. I will argue that being transgender is only peripherally relevant, and the potential risks to infants are unjustified.
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Vive la Bioéthique? France’s Bioethics Initiative

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Little noticed in the United States but a big deal in France, President Emmanuel Macron announced in January that he is creating a bioethics commission to review the country’s policies on a wide range of subjects, including human reproduction, euthanasia, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence. ...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Is Noninvasive Prenatal Genetic Testing Eugenic?

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Before noninvasive prenatal screening becomes a routine part of gestational care, society needs to have difficult conversations about the ethical implications and establish a paradigm for truly informed consent in reproductive decision-making. These are admirable goals, set out in an article by Vardi...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Cancer and Fertility: Learning from Survivors

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    As modern medicine improves survival odds, many young cancer patients are living long lives that bear the markings of the disease and its treatment. The side effects of chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery often include damage to fertility, such as early menopause or the loss of viable sperm. A recen...
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  • Hastings Center News

    Hastings Scholars in New England Journal of Medicine: Supporting Women’s Autonomy in Prenatal Testing

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    Hastings Center News
    Noninvasive fetal genetic sequencing done early in pregnancy is poised to become a routine part of prenatal care. While it could offer patients substantial benefits, there is a risk that it will be integrated into care “without the robust, evidence-based informed consent process necessary for respe...
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  • Hastings Center News

    Choosing Flourishing: Erik Parens Calls for Fresh Thinking on Disability

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    Hastings Center News
    Disability advocates and bioethicists have long debated whether it is appropriate for individuals, particularly prospective parents engaged in reproductive decision-making, to “choose disability,” as in the case of a deaf couple who would like to have a deaf child. In the current issue of the Ken...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    “The Handmaid’s Tale” and Modern-Day Surrogacy

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    With the wild popularity of the new TV series The Handmaid’s Tale, surrogacy is back in the limelight. The Hulu show, based on the cautionary novel of the same name by Margaret Atwood, follows Offred, a woman who is isolated and confined for the sole purpose of bearing children for the people who ...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Should We Stop Having Children?

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Not long ago, I received a questionnaire from an organization on a crusade to lower birthrates to protect the health and well-being of people and the environment. Called the Population Connection, it is the successor to ZPG (Zero Population Growth), started in the 1970s by Paul Ehrlich. Shortly there...
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  • Hastings Center News

    Genome Sequencing of Newborns: How Can It Be Done Responsibly?

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    Hastings Center News
    This was one of the many big questions explored at Genomics and Society, a major conference last week on the ethical, legal, and social implications of genomic research.
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  • Hastings Center News

    Helping Transgender Adolescents Make Informed Decisions About Their Reproductive Care

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    Hastings Center News
    Danielle is a 15-year-old transgender female who is about to begin hormone therapy. Her parents would like her to explore gamete cryopreservation – sperm freezing – as a means of preserving her fertility, which could be impaired by the hormone treatments. Danielle would prefer not to, remarking, ...
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  • Hastings Center News

    Association of Health Care Journalists Meeting Features Hastings Center Experts

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    Hastings Center News
    The Hastings Center teamed up with the Association of Health Care Journalists (AHCJ) to create three sessions on gene editing for its annual meeting in Orlando on April 20. In addition, Hastings Center research scholar Nancy Berlinger was a panelist on a session concerning health care for refugees an...
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  • Hastings Center News

    The Ethics of Making Babies

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    Hastings Center News
    On April 6-7, The Hastings Center co-sponsored “The Ethics of ‘Making Babies,’” Harvard Medical School’s Annual Bioethics Conference, which explored the ethical and legal issues raised by assisted reproductive technologies.  Josephine Johnston, director of research and a research scholar a...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Preventing Sex-Selective Abortions in America: A Solution in Search of a Problem

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Arkansas has recently joined seven other states (Arizona, Kansas, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and South Dakota) in banning abortions for sex selection. Arizona’s law requires doctors to ask a woman seeking an abortion if she knows the sex of the fetus, and if she does,...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    After the Election Bioethics Faces a Rocky Road

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Academic bioethics has never been popular with Republicans. Libertarians dislike academic bioethics because it seems too elitist and anti-free market.  Religious thinkers worry it is technocratic, soulless and crassly utilitarian. Now with Trumpism add a populist disdain for expertise, experts and t...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Questions About Using “Mosaic” Embryos in IVF

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Couples undergoing IVF routinely undergo preimplantation genetic screening, or PGS, to make sure that their embryos are viable and free of genetic disease. However, some embryos have both normal and abnormal cells, and at least some of these “mosaic” embryos are capable of developing into healthy...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Children at all Costs?

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    In the past few weeks, the North American media has been rife with stories about unusual births following fertility treatment. The first was that of Nadya Suleman (christened by the media as Octo-Mom, or Madame Ovary) – a California woman who recently gave birth to octuplets. This case raised a num...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Selective Parenting

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    For years, the abortion of fetuses likely to have disabilities has been called “selective abortion,” but, for reasons made clear in Hilde Lindemann’s thoughtful Bioethics Forumreflection on the matter, the practice might better be called “selective parenting.” It fundamentally reflects, aft...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Liberty Should Win: We May Choose Our Children’s Sexual Orientation

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Gay marriage is morally unacceptable – here’s why: Supporters of gay marriage undermine the rights of homosexuals because they provoke increased homophobic reactions and political mobilization in an already homophobic society. Sure, gay marriages in themselves harm no one and homophobic reacti...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    Liberty and Solidarity: May We Choose Children for Sexual Orientation?

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    In a just-published New York Magazine piece, “The Science of Gaydar,” writer David France looks at the growing scientific evidence for innate differences between gay and straight people. France ends by gazing towards the future, and asks the question, “What if prenatal tests were able to show a...
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  • Bioethics Forum Essay

    The Perils of Embryo Banking?

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    Bioethics Forum Essay
    Embryo banking is not an idea whose time has come. But at some point it might be, so a little ethical hyperventilating about the prospect is useful.
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