Tuesday, January 8. 2013
This is depressing. Costa Rica, the only country to have an outright ban on IVF because IVF creates and destroys human life on an industrial scale, has been told by a "human rights" court that they have to abandon their prohibition.
You would think that the numbers recently reported by the UK's Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority would bolster Costa Rica's case. In the UK, nearly 2 million IVF embryos have been created and then simply been discarded "unused." These shocking numbers prompted Lord Alton to say:
“It happens on a day-by-day basis with casual indifference. This sheer destruction of human embryos – most people would not know that it took place on such a scale."
But it seems that the mythical "right to have a child anyway I see fit" is more important than the very real "right to life." From the Costa Rica Star:
The Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) has overturned a prohibition on IVF in Costa Rica saying that it infringed provisions under the American Convention on Human Rights.
The ban was originally implemented by the Costa Rican Government in an effort to protect human life. Costa Rica’s Supreme Court ruled in 2000 that the practice of discarding ‘spare’ embryos in IVF was unconstitutional as it infringed the right to life under article 4 of the American Convention of Human Rights, which states: ‘Every person has the right to have his life respected… from the moment of conception’. It said IVF also violated the Costa Rican constitution....
Nine infertile couples petitioned the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in 2001 against the ban, which issued a statement indicating that Costa Rica’s prohibition infringed a number of rights. The IACHR heard the case in September last year and published its decision, dated 28 November, at the end of the year.
It ruled that Costa Rica’s prohibition on IVF violated the rights to privacy and family, and also infringed the principle of non-discrimination. It said infertility was a disease recognised by the World Health Organisation and that infertile people should be granted access to fertility treatment. It was disproportionate to require infertility couples to seek treatment abroad. Crucially, the IACHR said an embryo could not be a ‘person’ and considered that the ‘moment of conception’ occurs after implantation, and not fertilisation.
There is so much misdirection here I cannot handle it. First IVF does not "treat" infertility. It does not attempt to fix any of the causes of infertility. It only mass produces offspring in a dish in a desperate attempt to give parents a child. NaPro Technology actually addresses problem that is causing infertility so couples can get pregnant naturally, and not just once, but again and again. That is real treatment for the infertile.
Second, I know activists have been trying to keep pushing the definition of conception as far away from fertilization that they possible can, but I thought implantation was the farthest away they could get. But now the moment of conception takes place "after implantation"? How far after exactly? Pretty soon "human rights" courts are going to be telling that the moment of conception is right before birth. As Dr. Antony Caruso, an American reproductive endocrinologist, points out this ruling may set a dangerous precedent. He warned:
“The court appears to have radically changed the legal definition of conception, and is applying an artificial description to a natural process. Indeed, this could have a far reaching impact.”
And last but not least is the idea that childlessness is a somehow a human rights issue. Not just any human rights issue, but one that is more important than the right to life. This is the money quote:
Piero Tozzi, legal counsel with the Alliance Defending Freedom, an organisation of Christian leaders, said: ‘A preliminary reading of the ruling indicates that the Court elevated secondary rights-such as the right to privacy, a right to personal autonomy, and a right to sexual and reproductive health-above the right to life, which by necessity takes precedence over all the other rights’.
This is the world we live in. The right to life should trump all others but unfortunately it is shoved to the back of the line behind the "right to sexual health."
Looks like Costa Rica is going to bow to international pressure and comply with the court's demands which is really a tragedy since they were a beacon of reason in a ever increasing sea of emotional relativity.
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