Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

UAB pauses IVF procedures
https://www.al.com/news/2024/02/uab-pauses-in-vitro-fertilization-due-to-fear-of-prosecution-officials-say.html

Give us more than two candidate's to vote for in a national election. The two-party system is the problem. If there were no guarantees in Congress, maybe Americans wouldn't be so frustrated and checked out.

I feel like I have to chose between killing Palestinian children or embryos.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

UAB pauses IVF procedures
https://www.al.com/news/2024/02/uab-pauses-in-vitro-fertilization-due-to-fear-of-prosecution-officials-say.html

Give us more than two candidate's to vote for in a national election. The two-party system is the problem. If there were no guarantees in Congress, maybe Americans wouldn't be so frustrated and checked out.

I feel like I have to chose between killing Palestinian children or embryos.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

UAB pauses IVF procedures
https://www.al.com/news/2024/02/uab-pauses-in-vitro-fertilization-due-to-fear-of-prosecution-officials-say.html

Give us more than two candidate's to vote for in a national election. The two-party system is the problem. If there were no guarantees in Congress, maybe Americans wouldn't be so frustrated and checked out.

I feel like I have to chose between killing Palestinian children or embryos.

Anonymous wrote:

UAB pauses IVF procedures
https://www.al.com/news/2024/02/uab-pauses-in-vitro-fertilization-due-to-fear-of-prosecution-officials-say.html

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The facts of the original case are beyond bizarre and seem like some bad movie. A “patient” at a fertility clinic “eloped” and broke into the room that stored frozen embryos, broke into the storage and grabbed several frozen embryos (in their containers) with their bare hands. Since that was basically a serious freezer, the eloper’s hands were severely burned immediately from the freezing metal and so the eloper dropped all of the embryos he/she was carrying and them broke onto the floor. When the breach was discovered the frozen embryos essentially had died.

So this was a joint lawsuit from 3 of the affected families who lost embryos for “unlawful death”.

It seems more like destruction of property rather than 'unlawful death' would have been the proper route here, unless you have a the zealous of a religious fanatic.

So being a nerdy lawyer I was very curious about this case. It seems to be very Alabama law specific and hinged on whether the term "unborn child" of Alabama's Wrongful Death of a Minor Act includes embryos kept outside a uterus or "extrauterine children" aka frozen embryos kept in a freezer. Alabama already defines embryos as children because they're ruled life begins at conception but now we are talking about frozen embryos not inside a woman's uterus.

In this crazy case, the fertility clinic had their storage facility located inside a hospital and someone some unauthorized crazy person was able to walk into the storage room, open the special cryogenic freezer, pick up several embryos out of that freezer and drop them all over the floor (because the severe cold burned their hands so as a reflex they dropped them). So the embryos died. The case doesn't go into more of those facts like why were the door and freezer unlocked, who was this nut job, why did they do it, etc.

The families want to collect punitive damages under the Alabama Wrongful Death of a Minor Act, which is why they argued the embryos were children and not property. Hospital and Fertility Clinic argued that there an exception to this act because these embryos were not inside a uterus, but plaintiffs argued that would violate the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment (I think this point is key). I wouldn't be surprised to see that argued in the future. The court stated it didn't keep to decide that part because "unborn children are children under the Act, without exception based on developmental stage, physical location, or any other ancillary characteristics;" and because of that simple ruling it won't decide any of the other parts, case over.

Here is a link to the decision. https://publicportal-api.alappeals.gov/courts/68f021c4-6a44-4735-9a76-5360b2e8af13/cms/case/c93db586-ec08-4f14-a6ba-a149967e68b0/docketentrydocuments/bb88f2bf-19ca-498f-9fe2-f754d36c0ff2

So if SCOTUS takes this up does it open a giant barn door to fetal personhood nationwide? That’s an untenable mess for every American woman.

It will be interesting because the Alabama Wrongful Death of a Minor Act does not define "child," so they needed to look to legislative intent, and well, the law was written in 1872, when embryos outside the womb was not even a whisper of a thought in the most creative sci-fi author's brain. So, it literally could not have intended to cover this situation. So we shall see how this gets interpreted by this Court and their alleged views of construction. There is a lot of judicial contortion in this opinion already.

Anonymous wrote:

UAB pauses IVF procedures
https://www.al.com/news/2024/02/uab-pauses-in-vitro-fertilization-due-to-fear-of-prosecution-officials-say.html

Anonymous wrote:When I started trying to conceive I had two chemical pregnancies where I got a positive test but at my first ultrasound there was just an empty sac. No fetal pole, no fetus. So were these children? No, I don't think so. It took two ultrasounds at 6 and 8 weeks for each pregnancy to confirm that no fetus developed and in fact my pregnancy didn't even come close to producing a child.

When I did IVF I transferred two embryos each time, and both times only one fetus developed. In my IVFs they gave me photos of the pair of embryos both times...beautiful balls of cells that would become an amniotic sac, a placenta, and a baby, and only one did each time. How many children did I have? Not 6. I had 2...in middle school now and very real. I didn't in fact "lose" any children because only 2 of those embryos became a baby or had a heartbeat.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The facts of the original case are beyond bizarre and seem like some bad movie. A “patient” at a fertility clinic “eloped” and broke into the room that stored frozen embryos, broke into the storage and grabbed several frozen embryos (in their containers) with their bare hands. Since that was basically a serious freezer, the eloper’s hands were severely burned immediately from the freezing metal and so the eloper dropped all of the embryos he/she was carrying and them broke onto the floor. When the breach was discovered the frozen embryos essentially had died.

So this was a joint lawsuit from 3 of the affected families who lost embryos for “unlawful death”.

It seems more like destruction of property rather than 'unlawful death' would have been the proper route here, unless you have a the zealous of a religious fanatic.

So being a nerdy lawyer I was very curious about this case. It seems to be very Alabama law specific and hinged on whether the term "unborn child" of Alabama's Wrongful Death of a Minor Act includes embryos kept outside a uterus or "extrauterine children" aka frozen embryos kept in a freezer. Alabama already defines embryos as children because they're ruled life begins at conception but now we are talking about frozen embryos not inside a woman's uterus.

In this crazy case, the fertility clinic had their storage facility located inside a hospital and someone some unauthorized crazy person was able to walk into the storage room, open the special cryogenic freezer, pick up several embryos out of that freezer and drop them all over the floor (because the severe cold burned their hands so as a reflex they dropped them). So the embryos died. The case doesn't go into more of those facts like why were the door and freezer unlocked, who was this nut job, why did they do it, etc.

The families want to collect punitive damages under the Alabama Wrongful Death of a Minor Act, which is why they argued the embryos were children and not property. Hospital and Fertility Clinic argued that there an exception to this act because these embryos were not inside a uterus, but plaintiffs argued that would violate the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment (I think this point is key). I wouldn't be surprised to see that argued in the future. The court stated it didn't keep to decide that part because "unborn children are children under the Act, without exception based on developmental stage, physical location, or any other ancillary characteristics;" and because of that simple ruling it won't decide any of the other parts, case over.

Here is a link to the decision. https://publicportal-api.alappeals.gov/courts/68f021c4-6a44-4735-9a76-5360b2e8af13/cms/case/c93db586-ec08-4f14-a6ba-a149967e68b0/docketentrydocuments/bb88f2bf-19ca-498f-9fe2-f754d36c0ff2

So if SCOTUS takes this up does it open a giant barn door to fetal personhood nationwide? That’s an untenable mess for every American woman.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is good that this decision affects rich white people and men. That is the only way for those in charge to become outraged.

I hate the assumption that only "rich white people" pursue IVF. My online infertility support group consisted of about 30 women all undergoing IVF at the same time. Ages ranged from mid 20s to early 40s, and we ran the gamut from lower middle class to upper middle class. And this wasn't DCUM-area "middle class", either.
Most of us had some form of insurance coverage to make costs more affordable, but I know several women who had taken out loans to pay for it or received meds donated to their clinics.

Anonymous wrote:When I started trying to conceive I had two chemical pregnancies where I got a positive test but at my first ultrasound there was just an empty sac. No fetal pole, no fetus. So were these children? No, I don't think so. It took two ultrasounds at 6 and 8 weeks for each pregnancy to confirm that no fetus developed and in fact my pregnancy didn't even come close to producing a child.

When I did IVF I transferred two embryos each time, and both times only one fetus developed. In my IVFs they gave me photos of the pair of embryos both times...beautiful balls of cells that would become an amniotic sac, a placenta, and a baby, and only one did each time. How many children did I have? Not 6. I had 2...in middle school now and very real. I didn't in fact "lose" any children because only 2 of those embryos became a baby or had a heartbeat.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When I started trying to conceive I had two chemical pregnancies where I got a positive test but at my first ultrasound there was just an empty sac. No fetal pole, no fetus. So were these children? No, I don't think so. It took two ultrasounds at 6 and 8 weeks for each pregnancy to confirm that no fetus developed and in fact my pregnancy didn't even come close to producing a child.

When I did IVF I transferred two embryos each time, and both times only one fetus developed. In my IVFs they gave me photos of the pair of embryos both times...beautiful balls of cells that would become an amniotic sac, a placenta, and a baby, and only one did each time. How many children did I have? Not 6. I had 2...in middle school now and very real. I didn't in fact "lose" any children because only 2 of those embryos became a baby or had a heartbeat.

So true. This Alabama ruling is absurd.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The entire back story is completely nuts. I am not sure if it was a set up or what. It is actually somewhat common for mistakes to be made and have embryos accidentally destroyed by fertility clinics (most common scenario seems to be a power failure). There are multitudes of lawsuits that ensue over them.

But this case seems sketchy and there isn't much press at all about what happened. No info on the person who committed the act (man or woman, who were they, why were they in the hospital, were they ever caught), was anyone ever charged? From google it seems it happened in December 2020 and that the destroyed embryos were laying on the floor for some time before they were discovered. And if the person burned their hands, how were they not discovered? Didn't they need medical treatment?

Too many weird questions IMO.

Good point. And I read that all the couples who sued had actually already had kids through IVF several years ago (these were leftover embryos). So they possibly weren’t trying to ever do IVF again. I wonder if they were tricked or somehow convinced to pursue this wrongful death lawsuit.

They probably found hardcore forced birthers. Once they had the children they wanted, they no longer cared and were willing to be used as political pawns in order to spite women’s rights.

Anonymous wrote:When I started trying to conceive I had two chemical pregnancies where I got a positive test but at my first ultrasound there was just an empty sac. No fetal pole, no fetus. So were these children? No, I don't think so. It took two ultrasounds at 6 and 8 weeks for each pregnancy to confirm that no fetus developed and in fact my pregnancy didn't even come close to producing a child.

When I did IVF I transferred two embryos each time, and both times only one fetus developed. In my IVFs they gave me photos of the pair of embryos both times...beautiful balls of cells that would become an amniotic sac, a placenta, and a baby, and only one did each time. How many children did I have? Not 6. I had 2...in middle school now and very real. I didn't in fact "lose" any children because only 2 of those embryos became a baby or had a heartbeat.