After ‘grueling’ IVF journey, Rep. Lori Trahan has an eye on Biden’s SOTU, Alabama ruling:-Rep. Lori Trahan, a Democrat from Massachusetts, remembers those hard times very well. She had to deal with daily injections, multiple surgeries, constant doctor visits, a lot of emotional, physical, and financial stress, and a lot of sadness.
Every year, hundreds of thousands of women use IVF (in vitro fertilization) as their “last hope” to have a baby.
After ‘grueling’ IVF journey, Rep. Lori Trahan has an eye on Biden’s SOTU, Alabama ruling
“That process was harder than I thought it would be,” Trahan told USA TODAY. “Women don’t seem to talk about how hard it is.” I don’t talk about it much, but becoming a mom wasn’t easy for me.
Through IVF, Trahan, 50, is now the mother of two girls, ages 13 and 9. An egg and sperm are joined outside the body, or “in vitro,” which means “in glass.”
But she changed her mind about keeping that part of her life secret after the Alabama Supreme Court said last month that frozen embryos are children and that people can be sued if they are destroyed. The court’s decision scared people who wanted to have children and IVF centers, and the effects were felt right away in the real world. In vitro fertilization treatments were stopped at least three medical sites in Alabama.
What will Biden say about IVF during State of the Union?
Trahan, a member of the House Democratic Women’s Caucus, said that hopeful parents and medical professionals will be listening to President Joe Biden’s State of the Union speech on Thursday. They will be looking for signs that access to IVF, a valuable intervention, is not in danger.
Dr. Pietro Bortoletto, who is in charge of reproductive surgery at Boston IVF and helped Trahan have both of her girls through IVF, will be her guest at the event.
At the La Jolla IVF Clinic in La Jolla, California, on February 28, 2007, embryologist Ric Ross takes vials of human embryos out of a bag that stores liquid nitrogen. The Stem Cell resource lets people from all over the country send embryos to the clinic. These embryos are then sent to stem cell research labs to be studied.
“I believe that during his speech, President Biden will give millions of women across America hope that Democrats will do all they can to protect access to reproductive care, such as IVF, Mifepristone, and abortion,” she told USA TODAY.
Also Read:-First Amendment right to a drag show? Texas students ask Supreme Court for emergency ruling
In Trahan’s words, Biden will likely ask Congress to protect IVF and “restore the reproductive rights that have been systematically stripped from women in Republican controlled states like Alabama following the Dobbs’ decision.”
“Extrauterine children” were defined as frozen embryos in Alabama. The court said it had to “treat every human being in accordance with the fear of a holy God, who made them in His image.”
As lawmakers rushed to respond to the court’s sudden decision, both houses of the Alabama Legislature, which are controlled by Republicans, were set to vote Wednesday on identical bills that would protect patients and medical workers from civil and criminal liability for in vitro fertilization treatments.”The Alabama IVF case was not a unique case. “It was a warning,” Lois Frankel, D-Florida, Chair of the Democratic Women’s Caucus, said right after the decision. To protect the medicine, she called for national laws.
How common is IVF in the US?
The Centers for Disease Control say that about 2.3% of all babies born in the United States are the result of IVF or another form of assisted reproductive technology.
Dr. Bortoletto explained that people who use IVF aren’t just infertile couples. They’re also cancer patients who want to freeze their eggs before going through chemotherapy and people who don’t want to pass on genetic diseases like the BRCA mutation or cystic fibrosis to their children.
He said that women under the age of 35 who are going through IVF usually freeze between five and fifteen embryos during a single cycle. This is usually done so that the couple can use them to have more children in the future.
“Because the ovaries are younger and healthier, the younger you are, the more embryos you usually freeze,” he said. “When you get older, that number goes down, and IVF works less and less.”
University of Pennsylvania Health System says that in the U.S., a single IVF cycle could cost anywhere from $10,000 to $15,000. The exact cost depends on the patient’s insurance coverage, their health, and the treatment center they choose.
When a couple decides they want to have children, they usually throw away a lot of the embryos. A smaller number are given to study, to train embryologists, or even to other couples. He said it costs between $50 and $100 a month to freeze eggs, and most people do it for less than five years.
Frozen embryos as children can have a chilling effect
Legalizing embryos as people can make doctors and clinics less likely to treat them, as we saw right away in Alabama.
“It means that anyone who touches embryos could be charged with a serious crime.” That’s the doctors’ fault if the power goes out and the embryo gets hurt, said Dr. Bortoletto. If that egg is on a truck on its way to a new IVF center and the truck gets hit on the highway, the company is responsible. We are not talking about property damage; we are talking about murder and killing charges.”
Dr. Bortoletto said he hoped Biden would have a plan to make sure that all 50 states could get reproductive care.
The man said, “I want to know how we can protect IVF at the federal level so that all Americans can get this important, life-saving treatment without any problems.”
Trahan had to go through several IVF cycles because of miscarriages and other problems when she tried to get pregnant a second time. The Alabama decision was a “gut punch” for her, but it will keep her fighting.
She said, “When I look at my daughters, I remember how hard I worked to have them and the family I dreamed of.” “I will always be in this fight because I worry that they might not have the same chances that their mom did.”