Politics
Friday July 16, 2004
IVF Child Conceived With Dead Man's Sperm is Ruled by Court to be His Child
TODAY'S HEADLINES
E-MAIL
PRINT
TAKAMATSU, July 16, 2004 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The moral labyrinth created by the IVF industry is producing some of history's more memorable legal decisions. A Japanese court has ruled that the child born of IVF using a dead man's sperm is, in fact, the man's child. The child was conceived in a lab after his father died of leukemia. When the child's mother tried to register the birth, the local government refused to allow it on the grounds that the father had died more than 300 days before the birth date. The normal length of human gestation is about 270 days.
The woman filed a lawsuit to have her son legally recognized as the child of his father. The first court denied the suit on the grounds of "common sense" saying it was impossible to recognize the father-child relationship in such a case. The Takamatsu High Court overturned the lower court ruling.
Gillian Long, Research Director for Campaign Life Coalition who monitors the Japanese scene said, "The situation is so convoluted now with all the re-defining of what a human being is, what marriage is, what a parent is, that we now need court decisions reached by lawyers with no scientific competence to tell us what ought to be obvious to any fifth grader."
The deceased man had signed a statement that he did not want his sperm used to impregnate his widow after his death. Under the Japanese Civil Code a child has a right to be recognized as the child of his father up to three years after the father's death. However, the law makes no provision for the problems created by the new technologies.
"What is so hard to understand about all this, is that tomorrow a different court somewhere is going to decide that some other IVF child has no rights at all," Long said. Japan has just decided that with cloning for stem cells, those people are not people either. Some time, the law is going to have to make up its collective mind about what a human being is and what human rights really are."
Further coverage from Mainichi Daily News:
http://mdn.mainichi.co.jp/news/20040716p2a00m0dm009000c.html
ph
Back to TopLatest Headlines
- BREAKING: US Congress Passes Health Care Reform Bill 220 to 215
- Stupak Amendment to Health Care Bill Passes 240 - 194 Saturday Evening
- Major Health Care Development - Pro-Life Stupak Amendment Vote OK'd for Today
- NY Times: Dems Banking on Later Squeezing Pro-Life Language Out of Bill in Committee
- USCCB Spokesman: "Definitely Not True" that Bishops Support Bill As it Stands
- TIME Got it Wrong - Prof. George Opposed Grandiose Kennedy Funeral
- USCCB Condemnation Tears Facade off "Phony" Abortion Compromise for Health Bill
- Health Care Bill Includes Monthly Abortion Premium: House Minority Leader Boehner
- TIME Article Setting Burke Against O'Malley Called "Tactical strike" on Behalf of Catholic Left
- Dirty Fighting on Abortion Funding: Word-Games and Health-Care Theatrics Boggle the Mind
- Commentary on November 6 News
- Note to LifeSiteNews Subscribers with Rogers email addresses
- New York Gov. Declares Nov. 10 Extraordinary Legislative Session for Same-Sex "Marriage"
- Washington's Pro-Family Amendment Effort Defeated - R-71 Almost Certain to Pass
- Vote Pushed Back on Canadian Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide Bill to Dec. 2
- Elderly U.K. Couple in Good Health Commit Suicide, Complain of Assisted Suicide Law
- Texas Late-Term Abortionist and Baptist Minister Admits: "Am I killing? Yes, I am"
- New Evidence Contradicts CCHD's Findings on Accused Pro-Abortion Partner
- Quebec Priest Denies Possibility of Sexual Reorientation Therapy on TV
- New Hampshire Same-Sex "Marriage" Law in Crosshairs after Maine's Law Crumbles
- Brooklyn Bishop Criticized for Recorded Message Praising Pro-Abortion Politician
- First Group of "Traditionalist" Anglicans in Britain Votes to Enter Catholic Church
Most Read this Week
- Planned Parenthood Director Resigns after Watching Ultrasound of Abortion Procedure
- Nun Defiant Following Rebuke, but Stops Abortion Escorting
- Breaking: Dominican Community Apologizes for Nun Caught Acting as Abortion Escort
- Over 200 Christendom College Students Protest Abortion at Planned Parenthood Clinic
- TIME Article Setting Burke Against O'Malley Called "Tactical strike" on Behalf of Catholics Left
- Scottish Gay Rights Activists Found Guilty of Pedophilia Sentenced to Life Imprisonment
- Newly Identified Corporate Supporters of Planned Parenthood Named
- Major Health Care Bill Development - Stupak Hyde Amendment Vote OK'd
- Health Care Bill Includes Monthly Abortion Premium: House Minority Leader Boehner
- US Congress Passes Health Care Reform Bill 218 to 215
MORE NEWS: 
LifeSiteNews.com Home Page Last 10 Days Archives Special Reports
Copyright © LifeSiteNews.com. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivatives License. You may republish this article or portions of it without request provided the content is not altered and it is clearly attributed to "LifeSiteNews.com". Any website publishing of complete or large portions of original LifeSiteNews articles MUST additionally include a live link to www.LifeSiteNews.com. The link is not required for excerpts. Republishing of articles on LifeSiteNews.com from other sources as noted is subject to the conditions of those sources.