Not Always What They Seem

The other morning as I was driving into work and heard an advertisement that truly alarmed me. The ad was the exciting news that some company was now offering “pre-implantation genetic pre-screening of babies - so if you’ve always wanted a boy or a girl, now you can make that happen (for the low sum of $18,000).”

Let me explain why this is very sadly false advertising. The advertisement leaves the parents feeling as if doctors now have the technology to give them a boy or a girl. For one who is not aware of the science behind this, it would be assumed that a doctor can change the genetic code - essentially, choose which chromosome the baby will have, to give you a boy or a girl.

This, however, is absolutely not the case.

Every human begins as one single cell, dividing. That single cell has a unique genetic code that has never existed before, and cannot exist again. This is because that single cell is the fusion of the two cells from the parents, the mother and the father. That same egg cell from the mother, and that same sperm cell from the father, will not exist again. This is why the new cell, the fusion of the two parents’ cells, is unique and a new person. That cell then begins to divide, and this is precisely how we all begin to grow. That cell division goes on throughout our lives… our hair, our finger nails, our skin… we continue to divide and create new cells, and therefore continue growing.

This means that the genetic code that belongs to this unique individual, whether male or female, cannot be tampered with, without putting the life of the tiny person in great danger. The result is, sadly, the death of the person. Scientists cannot simply extract a Y chromosome or add a Y chromosome to affect the gender.

This leaves a question hanging in the air – how does this advertisement propose to offer genetic pre-screening, if it is not possible?

Now, I should clarify that there are different types of “pre-screening” and while many may be called “genetic,” this might be applicable to anything from checking for illness or disease to discovering information such as the gender of the child. So it is necessary for the parents to be aware of what type of “pre-screening” is intended. In this advertisement, it is a screening for the gender of the child.

To understand what “pre-implantation genetic pre-screening” is, one has to first understand two simple things: 1) the way each and every human life first begins, and 2) the process of in-vitro fertilization (IVF).

First, how we begin: the two parents’ cells fuse, creating a new cell, with its very own DNA, and this cell begins to divide and grow. While the new person is in the early stages of cell division, he or she is moving through the mother’s body (in the fallopian tube) toward the uterus. The mother’s uterus has one purpose – to house, feed and care for a new baby. The walls of the uterus build up a thick layer on the inside, which is what would feed and protect the baby, if a baby were to be conceived. This is the same wall that is shed every month in her cycle, if she does not conceive.

For the baby, the little cell in the process of dividing, the uterus is the place that sustains his or her life. The baby essentially eats into the thickened wall of the uterus, where he or she receives the necessary blood and nutrients to stay alive. Over time, the amniotic sac forms around the baby, and as the baby’s cells continue to divide and the baby continues to grow, the uterus expands to house and support the child.

This is the basic process for each and every one of us.

What about in-vitro fertilization, then? In this instance, the baby is not conceived within the mother. The two cells from the parents normally meet inside the mother’s body, and it is there in the fallopian tube that they fuse and the new person is created with his or her unique genetic code. In IVF, the two cells meet outside of the mother’s body, in a petri dish in a lab. The doctors or technicians will have harvested some egg cells from the mother’s body, and the father will have provided sperm cells. The doctors will ensure that a number of the mother’s eggs and the father’s sperm meet and fuse. Rather than only one new life formed, there will be three, four or sometimes more. This is because of the lessened success rate of the new child implanting into the mother’s uterus since the new child has been conceived outside of her body. The doctors understand that the parents desire to carry a baby all the way to term, and that they have not yet been successful in the natural format. Therefore, to strengthen the odds of success, the doctors will create a number of new lives, newly formed babies in their most early stage of development, and they will place more than one into the mother’s body with the hope that at least one is able to implant.

In general, if a couple is having trouble conceiving, there are many factors to be considered. Sometimes it is the timing of the mother’s fertility, which can be as small of a window as only a day, and perhaps she has not been intimate with her husband consistently during that small window, and therefore has not been able to get pregnant. Women can find out about their individual fertility (because every woman’s is different) through learning about their cycles. This is easiest through what is called Natural Family Planning (NFP). A popular version of NFP is called NaPro Technology. I suggest looking it up!

Another reason the mother may not be able to conceive is a problem with her uterine wall lining. Hormones control the thickening of that inside wall of the uterus. If the wall is too thin, it may be that the mother has conceived a child, or even repeatedly conceived children, but that each time the new life reaches the uterus, it cannot stay alive. If there is not enough oxygen and nutrients for the baby, it will die. The mother would probably not know that she had conceived or that her child had not survived, because the uterine wall will shed in her monthly cycle just like always, and she will assume she was never pregnant. This is because only when a child does implant into the thickened wall of the uterus will hormones signal to the body that the normal cycle must stop. This is why the uterine wall won’t shed, once a mother does conceive, under normal circumstances. The baby’s presence there triggers hormones that signal to the body that the monthly cycle should not happen, and allow the baby to continue to live and grow.

With this in mind, it is more easy to understand why in IVF doctors conceive multiple children outside of the womb for the parents, because it is very likely and possible that the little persons will not be able to make it to the uterine wall and implant. So they “up the odds” by placing three or four of the tiny babies into the mother, in the hopes that one will be able to implant in the uterus. Occasionally, parents will end up conceiving twins or even more babies at once, because the doctors have put in a number of living human beings, and more than one implants.

Perhaps the obvious question is – what happens to the other little lives? If the doctors had brought four of the mother’s egg cells together with four of the father’s sperm, and now there are four unique and new human beings formed, what happens if only one of them does implant in the uterus? Unfortunately, the others will perish. The risk of removing the act of conception from the inside of the mother’s body is that it almost always guarantees that at least one of the children will die. If the doctors discuss with the parents ahead of time that they will put three of the little babies into the mother, with the hopes that one will implant in the uterus, than the other two will be lost. The mother will not be aware of them passing, because as they are so tiny, they will simply come out either with her next menstruation (if none of the babies implant) or in some other form of mucus (if at least one baby implants).

Further, what if the doctors brought five of the mother’s eggs with the father’s sperm, and there are five little lives created, but they only want to implant three, to avoid the risk of carrying quadruplets? What then happens to the other two? Unfortunately, again, these children die. Typically, the doctors will say that the “excess” babies (they will probably refer to them as embryos, which is the scientific term for a human life at that stage in its development), will be discarded. Discarded does mean “thrown-away.” Sometimes parents are given the option of “freezing” the babies that have been conceived – this would mean that they are preserved in the lab until a year, two or three later, when the couple may want to try getting pregnant again with the help of IVF. Sadly, freezing often leads to the death of the baby as well, as the human person cannot always sustain life in that environment, or because when the babies are “thawed” after the freezing, the cells are not able to sustain themselves and the child perishes.

This is a great risk for a mother and father to consider, as the “side-effect” of wanting to conceive a child and bring it to the world after about nine months of growing in the womb is that other children will be killed in the process.

How does “pre-implantation genetic pre-screening” fit in? This term should begin to be much more easily understood after all that has been discussed above. “Pre-implantation” means, “before the doctors put the newly formed human lives into the mother, in hopes that at least one will implant in the uterus.” In other words, while the newly formed babies are still in the petri dish. “Genetic pre-screening” is at least honest in what it is called – the doctors are not changing the genetic code or tampering with the newly formed DNA, but screening it. In this case, the doctors are checking the new DNA of the new person to see if that person does or does not have the Y chromosome (which determines if the person is male or female).

So what is this advertisement actually saying? It is saying that if parents desire to conceive a child and they want to pay a fee to conceive only a boy or only a girl, the doctors can screen all of the children who have been conceived in the petri dish and determine which are male and which are female. Then the doctors can implant only the male or female embryos into the mother. Therefore, should any of the babies be able to implant and begin to grow inside the mother, the baby can only be the gender that the parents desired.

What does the mean? It means that parents, in a harsh light, are being offered a form of “gendercide.” Gender-selective killing. Certainly, many do not know that this is what is happening. It is perhaps more innocent to think that doctor’s can genetically manipulate a child to make him or her the gender that is desired, although this too calls into question the ethics of the situation. But certainly, there is no other way to paint the “pre-implantation genetic pre-screening for gender” than to clarify that if parents want a boy, the doctors will make sure the females are discarded (killed). Likewise, if the parents want a girl, the doctors will eliminate the males.

This kind of practice is sadly very active concerning disabilities or handicaps (another form of genetic pre-screening that is offered). Statistics from 2009 show that 90% of mothers with confirmed diagnosis of down syndrome chose to abort their babies, and in 2011,that number was raised to 92%. This is only one example, but it is certainly chilling. It is something that should make us pause when we consider that in-vitro fertilization is presented as a form of help or assistance for conceiving life, and yet it also facilitates a large amount of death. If so many lives are ended because of a possible disability (as no diagnosis can be 100% accurate), is it really shocking that the next step is a gender selection? Is it hard to imagine that in ten years it could easily become an even more substantive form of selection, perhaps considering eye color or hair color as means for ending a life if the color is not desired?

This is the reason that I was so affronted by the advertisement; it is one evil to decide that lives can be played with to appease a desire. It is another thing to attract men and women to participate in this kind of violence by falsifying the work being done. Parents do not need to be lied to – should not be lied to – especially when so many are hurting from their struggles with infertility or miscarriages already. Men and women need to be aware of the dangers involved with IVF, and the sad “side effects” that are included when one pursues conception in a pertri dish. It is a tragedy that parents are losing the lives of their children in the attempt of giving birth to one.

For more information, please follow the included links, or do some further research (I recommend this article for some fast facts: http://www.fathersforgood.org/ffg/en/big_four/woman_wellbeing.html)