[LEGAL STUDIES]Discuss the issues surrounding IVF surrogacy and cloning, showing both sides of the argument and also at the same time, give your opinion

Essay by ruskipaulHigh School, 11th gradeA+, April 2003

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IVF, surrogacy, cloning and genetic experimentation are reasonably recent ideas and technologies that can certainly be improved on and explored further. But is it really the path the human race wants to take? Children being born to one mother and taken care of by another? Two people exact copies of each other? Living beings being altered from their natural form for the sake of our comfort and lifestyle? Raising our children in machines?

We have put laws in place to control these matters and during this essay ill discuss if they are doing enough and whether our society is better with or without IVF, surrogacy, cloning and genetic experimentation.

IVF (in vitro fertilisation) treatment began in 1978 and involves the fertilisation of a woman's eggs outside her womb. They are fertilised by donor sperm and then after two or three days they are reinserted into the womb. The pregnancy then continues like any other normal pregnancy.

IVF can assist couples who for one reason or another are infertile and unable to have children. However there are a lot of problems. In an attempt to prevent children being born to unsuitable parents there are some restrictions places on who can receive IVF fertilisation:

*The woman must be married or in a de facto relationship

*Both the woman and her partner must consent to the treatment

*A doctor must be satisfied that the woman is infertile or that any child she did naturally conceive would be likely to have diseases or abnormalities

*Both the woman and her partner must undergo counselling before consenting to treatment

*A man must consent the use of his sperm with any woman other than his wife

*A woman must consent for her ova to be used by any other woman

*If a donor is married the spouse...