Is Eight Enough?
posted by Jennifer Collins
It is wonderful to be back on Concurring Opinions and I want to thank Dan for graciously inviting me to return. I want to start off my guest stint by mentioning a family law piece that I am currently working on. Naomi Cahn and I have a forthcoming essay in the Northwestern Colloquy, which we plan to follow up with a longer article, about some of the legal and ethical issues raised by the recent birth of octuplets in California. Although large families have traditionally been celebrated in our culture — consider the recent success of the cable show “Jon & Kate Plus Eight,” as well as those old pop culture standbys “The Brady Bunch” and “Cheaper by the Dozen” — the reactions to the Suleman case have been very different, with everyone from doctors to bloggers to her own parents deeming the births “a medical catastrophe” and “absolutely irresponsible.” Two states — Georgia and Missouri — have already introduced legislation in response to the births. In the essay, Naomi and I argue that restrictions on the number of embyros that can be transferred in any single IVF procedure are justifiable, as long as we couple that effort with increased insurance coverage and some potential for flexibility in an individual case. But we also argue that increased restrictions on access to fertility treatment cannot be justified. We therefore diverge from those commentators who argue that we should consider things like marital status, existing family size or financial resources in deciding which individuals may receive fertility treatment. Because this project is still very much a work in progress, we would welcome any comments or feedback.
April 16, 2009 at 1:26 pm
Posted in: Family Law
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Responses (1)
Lia - April 24, 2009 at 12:12 am
I think your point regarding access to fertility treatment is on the ball. I look forward to future posts on this project. I hope it will discuss some of the possible sociological underpinnings of current aims to limit fertility treatment access, particularly regarding patriarchal fears of full female reproductive control. I also really like how nicely this project fits with discourse analyses of popular rhetoric surrounding these legal issues. It’s always so interesting when the relationships between law and rhetoric are blatant.
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