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Content archived on 2024-05-07

European Network for Biomedical Ethics: Ethical Problems of In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) with Particular Regard to its Connection with Genetic Diagnosis and Therapy

Objective

When IVF in conjunction with embryo transfer became feasible in the late 70ies there was a heated dispute about principles. This dispute subsided very much when IVF came to be a standardized infertility therapy. But now and then sensational news attracts attention (surrogate motherhood after the mother died, artificial insemination after the menopause). The proposed project, however, shall be concerned neither with the routine nor with the extremes.

Rather, experiences with IVF shall be reviewed and analysed with regard to certain ethical questions. In particular, we are working towards an ethical evaluation of the psychosocial consequences and of the medical success rates of this technology. These aspects are the basis for counselling before and after IVF is applied. Further more, fundamental issues in social ethics are at stake which the discussion until now has stated but not investigated thoroughly enough. An example is the problem of a right to a child of one's own and of the technology-assisted satisfaction of such a presumptive claim.

This project shall focus on the connecting lines between IVF and genetic diagnosis and therapy. The objective is to discuss preimplantation genetic diagnosis as an alternative to the available procedures in prenatal diagnosis as well as to the possibilities of gene therapy.
This new discussion is a research desideratum. The application of IVF might change fundamentally if it were no longer indicated only for infertility treatment but also in order to detect and avoid hereditary handicaps. The ethical key question here is whether eugenic goals can be sufficiently excluded. This discussion requires a comparative review of the ethical debates and of the legal regulations in different countries. The experience available and the future developments to be expected in the context of applied IVF shall be reviewed comprehensively.

The possible conflicts of interest shall be clearly presented and assessed, and the different national and professional perspectives will be compared. Thus, the project will contribute to the purpose of establishing a European consensus

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CON - Coordination of research actions

Coordinator

Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen
EU contribution
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Address
17,Keplerstrasse
72074 Tübingen
Germany

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Total cost

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