In vitro industry out of control

By David Gushee
Thursday, 19 February 2009

(ABP) -- In January, a California woman named Nadya Suleman gave birth to octuplets through in vitro fertilization. These eight babies were added to six others that Suleman had also conceived through in vitro procedures.

Nadya Suleman is an extreme example of a growing trend. The reproductive-technology industry is booming, with over 130,000 procedures and 50,000 births a year, up from around 65,000 procedures and just below 20,000 births a little over a decade ago. Almost 90 percent of in vitro procedures involve transferring more than one embryo; nearly a third of in vitro live births involve multiple children; 2 percent of them involve triplets or more. And these multiple births often come with health consequences such as the need for long-term care due to low birth weights and various disabilities. Sometimes these long-term expenses are paid by the taxpayer.

Demand for in vitro and other reproductive technologies is driven from a number of directions. Infertility rates among couples seeking children now stand at over 10%, due to social and environmental factors. Single and divorced women, and some men, also have turned to the industry in search of the children they cannot have any other way. The breakdown of marriage has produced more and more people in such situations.

The reproductive-technology industry is almost entirely unregulated. the rest