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Adoptive Parents of Girl Frozen as Embryo Battle Embryonic Stem Cell Research

By Gudrun Schultz

DOVER, Delaware, April 19, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A couple who adopted their two-year-old daughter as a frozen embryo left stored in a fertility clinic freezer, are now using their story to fight against legislation that would permit research using human embryos, the Dialog reported April 16.

Tim and Dawn Smith adopted their daughter Erin 11 years after she was conceived in a petri dish during in vitro fertilization proceedings. Unused by her biological parents, the child remained frozen in storage and faced likely destruction by eventual discarding.

After learning they were unable to conceive children of their own, the Smiths opted for a relatively new option for infertile couples wanting to start a family--embryo adoption. Erin was adopted as an embryo and then implanted in Dawn’s womb, enabling Dawn to become both her birth and adoptive mother.

Hearing of efforts to combat proposed legislation that would permit couples to donate leftover embryos for stem-cell research, the Smith’s offered their participation as a couple able to personalize the issue for the public. Tim Smith has appeared in radio commercials funded by A Rose and a Prayer, a group opposed to human embryonic research, speaking about his daughter as a “typical 2-year-old.”

“Some would call Erin medical waste,” he says in the commercial. “I call her my daughter.”

The Delaware Senate voted 13-7 March 29 in favour of the Delaware Regenerative Medicine Act, scheduled to go before the House shortly. Supporters for SB 5 argue that “at present, excess human embryos created during in vitro fertilization procedures are typically discarded, and thus destroyed, when embryos are no longer needed for fertility treatment.”

Smith’s radio message points out that the legislation addresses the fate of actual people already in existence. “If Delaware’s legislature passes Senate Bill 5, embryos like Erin could be killed and used for medical experiments,” he states.

Read full coverage by The Dialog, posted on Catholic Online:
http://www.catholic.org/national/national_story.php?id=23776

See related LifeSiteNews coverage:

President Bush Discusses Embryo Adoption and Stem Cell Research
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/may/05052404.html

CANADIAN FROZEN EMBRYO ADOPTION PROGRAM LAUNCHED
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2002/mar/02030605.html

Frozen Embryos And Stem Cell Research
http://www.lifesite.net/features/stemcellembryo/discussionpaper.html

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