By John Jalsevac
England, February 15, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) – An editorial in the most recent issue of the influential British Medical Journal (BMJ) highlights the increasing global problem of infertility, and speculates that there may be a possible link to IVF.
According to authors Drs. Jens Bonde and Jorn Olsen, at present approximately 15% of couples who try to conceive are affected by infertility. The consequence of this has been that “up to 6% of children are conceived through assisted reproductive techniques.”
Olsen and Bone speculate that the increased rate of infertility may, however, be an unintended consequence of the increasing use of assisted reproductive technologies, such as IVF, the reason being that infertility likely has “a strong genetic component.”
“With the advent of assisted conception, subfertile couples may have as many children as fertile couples, so that genetic factors linked to infertility will become more prevalent in the generations to come,” write Bonde and Olsen.
Given this “fecundity is expected to decline over time, even if no evident causative environmental exposures are present.” Hence, according to this model, as IVF becomes more common, infertility will also become more common. Over time, as infertility increases, more and more infertile couples will then turn towards IVF, creating a cycle which results in ever climbing rates of infertility, as the genetic abnormalities that result in infertility are distributed more widely among the population.
Other studies have shown that skyrocketing infertility rates can be linked to the increasing instance of sexually transmitted diseases, abortion, contraceptive use, and the advanced age at which many women begin to attempt to become pregnant.
With infertility on the rise, more and more couples are turning to artificial reproductive technologies to fulfill their dream of having a child. The unintended fallout of the increasing commonness of technologies such as IVF, however – besides the possible link to increasing infertility – has been the death of millions of unborn children, in the earliest stages of their development, in fertility clinics across the world.
It was revealed last month that in Britain alone over 1 million embryonic human beings have been killed in IVF clinics in the past 14 years.
See previous LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
UK IVF Clinics Have Intentionally Killed over One Million Human Embryonic Children
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jan/08010201.html
Children Conceived by IVF Have Nearly Twice as Many Health Problems
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/jul/07072405.html
Lesbian Couple Sue IVF Doctor for Cost of Raising Twin
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/sep/07092003.html
More Health Risks Found in IVF Babies – Scientist Suggests IVF Children Should be Monitored into Adulthood
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/jul/07072709.html
British Woman Died of Internal Bleeding After IVF Procedure
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/aug/06081006.html
Canadian IVF Researchers Admit 80-90% of IVF-Created Human Embryos Doomed to Die
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2003/nov/03112601.html