News

BOSTON, Sept 18 (LSN) – This week EWTN news featured a special report from the National Catholic Bioethics Center (NCBC) outlining the moral problems associated with invitro fertilization in response to the recent media attention given to the IVF sex-selection technique. Arguments for the acceptance of the procedure based on considerations of avoiding sex-linked genetic disorders are compelling and require effective counter arguments.  NCBC President John M. Haas outlined the following concerns with the procedure:  1   “the sperm is collected by masturbation”  2   “the new life is engendered in a petri dish (in vitro)—a technique which has been condemned by the 1987 Vatican document Donum Vitae because it replaces the marital act”  3   “with in vitro fertilization a number of nascent lives are invariably destroyed in the process”  With respect to the sex-selection technique specifically, Haas notes that “it is not known what effect the fluorescent dye (used to identify the sex of the fertilized egg) might have on the genetic make-up of the future child.”