Through the wonders of science, infertile couples who were
previously unable to bear children, due to reasons such as blocked
fallopian tubes, low sperm count, low egg quantities or advanced age
of the mother, are now able to conceive through in-vitro
fertilization. The results are babies known as test-tube babies
which are technically conceived outside the womb.
In a natural scenario, the conception of a baby occurs when the
ovum, travels from the ovaries, through the fallopian tube to be
fertilized by the sperm of the father during sexual intercourse.
>From this point on, the fertilized egg will travel down towards the
uterus and during the process division of cells will occur until it
reaches its final destination at the wall of the uterus. However, in
the cases of block fallopian tubes, the eggs are unable to travel
from the ovaries to the uterus and conception cannot happen.
Developed in the United Kingdom by Dr. Patrick Steptoe and Dr.
Robert Edwards, the process of in-vitro fertilization involves
removing eggs from the ovaries of the mother and combining them with
the sperm of the father in a lab environment. The fertilized egg is
then placed back into the uterus of the mother after 3 to 5 days and
will remain there to grow till birth. Because of the low success
pregnancy rate of this procedure, a few eggs are placed in the
uterus to increase the odds of success. With this process,
statistics have shown that the rates of multiple births have
increased where 24 percent of the in-vitro fertilization births have
produced twins.
The first test-tube baby, Louise Brown, who was born on the 25th
July 1978, marked hope for other infertile couples to have a baby
through this procedure. However, many others were concerned about
the ethical issues surround this. One major area of concern was the
fact that as the egg is located outside the womb for a few days
while the cells multiplied before being put back inside the uterus,
the health issues affecting this baby is unknown. Indeed, research
has been shown that test-tube babies have a higher chance of birth
defects and low birth weight, and researchers still have not been
able to determine the reason for this.
Other issue of concern is that through this procedure, some of the
eggs fertilized in the lab are later discarded. Does this procedure
mean that the researchers are actually killing potential people? How
is the line drawn in this case?
Then there is also the issue of commercial opportunities for eggs
and sperms to be bought and surrogate wombs to be rented with the
purpose of creating babies. This process of embryo transfer to
another mother, not necessarily the same woman who had provided the
eggs, is known as placing the embryo in a gestational carrier. This
procedure has been becoming increasingly common through
technological advancement, which has made couples including women
with uterus problems, have a chance in having their baby.
Test-tube babies have really brought changes to the way in which
babies are conceived and have given much hope to many who have had
problems having babies through the process of fake fertilisation. However, the
downside of this are the ethical issues behind the procedure, with
which still poses a big question mark and with which is still
opposed by many factions. For more details on cell biology
please visit http://www.biology- online.org/tutorials/1_cell_biology.htm
Author's bio
Dr.Richard Waller has been helping thousands of infetile couples and
gave hope to childless women since 1999 through the process of i
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