The AL #legislature voted Thurs to #protect#doctors doing IVF from #criminal or #civil#liability if #embryos they help to create are subsequently damaged or destroyed.
The fast action by both the House & Senate on bills to shield IVF came >2 wks after the state’s Supreme Court ruled that #FrozenEmbryos are people & that individuals could be liable for destroying them.
The unprecedented decision, which gave fertilized eggs the same protection as babies under the state’s #WrongfulDeath of a Minor Act, threw #IVF treatment in #Alabama into turmoil. W/in days, nearly every clinic in the state either suspended IVF or halted #embryo disposal. Some #women in the middle of treatment fled the state after securing care from out-of-state providers. Many others feared that their significant emotional, physical & financial investment in having a child would be for naught.
…The measures that passed almost unanimously in both #Alabama chambers Thurs afternoon provide #legal#immunity “for death or damage to an #embryo to any individual or entity when providing or receiving goods or services related to in vitro fertilization.”
They provoked heated, highly emotional debate about #women’s #ReproductiveRights & how the #state has defined when life begins, most recently in a 2018 constitutional amendment cited in the court ruling.
“What happens to those children that are left in that cold freezer, those babies?” asked Sen Bobby Singleton, the #Democratic min ldr. “Because that’s life.”
Sen Timothy Melson, a ret anesthesiologist who sponsored the bill, replied that #IVF doctors “frequently eliminate the ones that aren’t optimal.”
“That’s #abortion now!” Singleton shouted, noting that he’d heard from women… worried about being charged w/ #crimes
Singleton accused his colleague of relying too heavily on clinics &trial #lawyers in writing the measure,granting #doctors#immunity but not female #patients.
“We’re getting into a deep subj as far as when life begins & #abortion,” said Melson,a #Republican. “I’m not trying to take anybody’s rights away. I’m just trying to help these ladies. I’m sympathetic to their cause…”
Sen LarryStutts (R), an #OBGYN &the bill’s sponsor,…said discarded #embryos are “a small, small percentage”…. #law#Alabama
@Nonilex
Late-term abortions due to a fetal defect are a small, small percentage of total abortions, in case they want to apply the math equally, as are rapes and incest.
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