The central pillar of the Children and Family Relationships Bill’s assisted reproduction regulations is an attempt to outlaw anonymous egg and sperm donation and force every donor-conceived child to be given the opportunity to identify and meet their donor once they have reached 18.
Tag: reproduction
Researchers One Step Closer to Unraveling Complex Processes Crucial to Sperm Development
Researchers are one step closer to unraveling the extraordinarily complex series of processes that leads to an event crucial to human reproduction: the creation of sperm.
Sperm Donors Are Winning Visitation Rights
When it comes to parents, it seems that three or even four is no longer a crowd. At least, that’s the conclusion one might draw from the case of Sheena and Tiara Yates, a married lesbian couple in New Jersey. They’ve had their parenting expectations upended—twice—by the sperm donors of their two kids. Both men agreed, in writing, to provide their raw materials and to leave the parenting to the women. But then they decided that, after all, they’d like to have some role in the lives of their biological children, so they applied for visitation rights. As of now, the bio dads are winning. Their case is just the latest reminder of how perilous and confusing assisted reproduction cases can become.
Elective Human Egg Freezing on the Rise
Human egg freezing is going mainstream. The biggest reason: it works. A handful of studies suggest the success rate for women undergoing in vitro fertilization (IVF) is just as high when using frozen eggs as fresh ones. The results increase the flexibility and control women can have in their reproduction and their careers.
The Long, Strange History of Birth Control
Writing in the New York Review of Books last year, Carl Djerassi declared that with the invention of the birth control pill, “sex became separated from its reproductive consequences” and “changed the realities of human reproduction.” Djerassi would know. The pioneering chemist, who died on Jan. 30 of complications from liver and bone cancer at the age of 91, was dubbed the father of the birth control pill after he created the key ingredient used in oral contraceptives.
Egg-Freezing Shindigs Aren’t Like Tupperware Parties
The latest trend in assisted reproduction is egg-freezing parties, sales events often described as the “new Tupperware parties.”
Single Mutation in Beta-Catenin Gene Can Lead to Infertility
Scientists from the RIKEN BioResource Center in Tsukuba, Japan, have discovered that a single mutation in the beta-catenin gene, which codes a protein known to be deeply involved in a number of developmental and homeostatic processes, can lead to infertility not through a disruption of the production of egg or sperm cells, but rather by leading to abnormalities in the morphology of the sexual organs, making natural reproduction impossible.
Could Household Detergents Reduce Fertility?
Two active ingredients commonly found in household detergents caused reproductive decline in mice, according to a new study published in the journal Reproductive Technology, prompting concerns about how these ingredients affect reproduction in humans.
$10M Grant Establishes Center for Reproductive Genomics
A five-year, $10 million Specialized Research Center grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) will help scientists from across campus tackle the roots of reproductive issues and train the next generation of reproduction scientists.
Updating New York’s Surrogacy Laws
Saying that New York law has failed to keep pace with medical advances in assisted reproduction, two lawmakers are drawing attention to a bill meant to ease the process for parents who cannot conceive to use a surrogate to have their child.