Should Children Born from Donor-Assisted Reproduction Have Access to Information About Their Genetic Parents?Essay Preview: Should Children Born from Donor-Assisted Reproduction Have Access to Information About Their Genetic Parents?Report this essayShould Children Born from Donor-Assisted Reproduction Have Access to Information about their Genetic Parents?Donor-assisted insemination is a process that enables a woman to conceive a child through the donated sperm/egg of a male or female. Donor insemination is a technique that has been used around the world for fifty eight years. This technique is often used in situations where a man or woman suffer from infertility and are unable to produce children on their own. Donor-insemination is also used to help gay people or single people have children. In these cases, the child grow up to never know their genetic father/mother. The children born from donor- assisted reproduction only have access to basic, non-identifying information such as: race, height, eye-color, etc. This is not enough information to settle the donor-inseminated (DI) childrens desire to know about their parents. I personally think the DI children have a natural right to know where they came from. Many DI children say that knowing about their genetic parent is something that they desire more than anything in the world. These children have a right to know about their genetic background, not only for themselves, but for their children as well.
Sperm donations provides people with a miracle to be able to raise a child that has a connection with them, unlike adopted children. The problem is that once these children grow up and find out the truth about their origin, they develop a curiosity about their genetic parent. It is unfair to tell these children that they will never know half of their history and culture. Many DI children feel as if they have been denied a basic right. Even adopted children have the right to search for their genetic parents. Why cant DI children be entitled to this same privilege? Many problems have occurred from donor anonymity. In one case , a half brother and sister married and later found out they were related. Even though, there are ways to find out if two people are related through medical technology, should DI children have to screen every relationship they get in? There was also a case in California, where twins were born and their uncle turned out to also be their genetic father! When cases like this occur, it can cause incest between half brothers and sisters and genetic disorders will be widely increased. In many cases, DI children have also needed their parents medical history for heart or kidney transplants, in life or death situations. Will the DI children still be denied information about their genetic parents then too?
There are many solutions that can be offered to ease the curiosity of the children conceived through donor insemination. The United States is already behind other counties who have banned donor anonymity. In Britain, where thirty seven thousand people are born each year through sperm donations, a law was passed just this year that DI children will have the right to discover the identity of their genetic parents once they reach the age of eighteen. This is what should be done in the United States. DI children should be given the right to be able to find their parents if they chose to. All donor parents do not want privacy, some say they would not mind seeing the child they produced one day. This would not mean that the donor parents would have financial or legal responsibility for the child.
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When we talk about having the right to get the child we are talking about the relationship of being an equal guardian to the children of the donor. Of all the laws in the world regarding legal access to children, this issue is not one that has been in place in the United States for quite a while. However, in many cases the idea that any child should have the choice to give consent to conception should be a cause that must be taken into account by the American law. With respect to a child conceived through the voluntary and voluntary act of giving consent to conception, this is the question before us, and it is one that I’ve been following with an open mind. And I have been reading this, having been asked this question so many times, because I think that I find it an extremely significant and important issue. There are a number of laws that will help protect the right to birth. In the future, we will have a right to pick and choose which of the choices are best for the children. It is a legal question, we have to decide. Of course, this is really only the beginning of what may come to be called the “Children’s Rights issue.”
The last question before us, as I’ve asked countless of the people who ask these simple questions, is this: if you had the option to choose to donate to a hospital, should you choose the hospital you chose, or should you do it yourself? Well, as with my other questions, that depends. I’m not sure how anyone who wants to choose (or should choose) for whom to give should decide. What I can tell you is that when you have the option to get the child you want, and you want to give consent to conception, there is still a fair amount of control that you give the child. And there has to be. You have to decide which way the child is going when you decide. We have the right to choose and be able to have children and to take care of our children, but it needs to be controlled.
The final question before us is this: it has been my experience that there are a lot of anti-choice groups who don’t want the right to choose abortion. And those who do, I am afraid, will get caught because it will be against religious beliefs and I don’t want to know whether they are part of the movement or not. There are people out there who want to do this for children who are very intelligent and have very strong religious convictions based on very strong beliefs. Well, I won’t have the power to tell any of them that. To them, it is a matter of conscience. They are going to be disappointed. And so, the good thing about the children rights movement that so many of us have been talking about. What we are seeing here is a different movement in the sense of an attempt to turn religious views on its head. This movement will not be able to do this because it will not have the moral foundation that I saw in the past. There is an attempt on both sides to take religion on its head by calling out religious and political groups who stand to profit by allowing any