The changing face of family law: Global consequences of embedding physicians and biotechnology in the parent-child relationship

Family Law Quarterly

Volumn 42, Issue 3, 2008, Pages 511-528

  Annas, George J ^a,b  

^a BOSTON UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b BOSTON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 69249139942     PISSN: 0014729X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Review

References (56)

1. See generally Ruth Deech & Anna Smajdor, From IVF to Immortality: Controversy in the Era of Reproductive Technology (2008)
2. Sanford N. Katz, Family Law in America (2003)
3. Bruce Lord Wilder, Current Status of Assisted Reproduction Technology in 2005: An Overview and Glance at the Future, 39 Fam. L.Q. 573 (2005).
4. See generally Lee M. Silver, Remaking Eden: Cloning and Beyond in a Brave New World (1997).
5. Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita 172 (1955).
6. Id. at 174.
7. Harold Bloom, Foreword to Eugene O'Neill, Long Day's Journey into Night, at xii (1987).
8. -410 U.S. 113 (1973).
9. See generally John A. Robertson, Children of Choice (1994).
10. George J. Annas, Fathers Anonymous: Beyond the Best Interests of the Sperm Donor, 14 Fam. L.Q. 1, 12 (1979).
11. Id. at 12-13.
12. George J. Annas & Sherman Elias, In Vitro Fertilization and Embryo Transfer: Medicolegal Aspects of a New Technique to Create a Family, 17 Fam. L.Q. 199 (1983).
13. Id. at 223.
14. Id. at 200.
15. Id. at 223.
16. Id. at 222.
17. Id. at5n.l.
18. This section is adapted from George J. Annas, The Shadowlands: Secrets, Lies, and Assisted Reproduction, 339 New Eng. J. Med. 935 (1998).
19. See In re Marriage of Buzzanca, 72 Cal. Rptr. 2d 280 (Ct. App. 1998).
20. Id. at 282.
21. To make sure no one missed the analogy used, the court later expands on this conclusion, saying that gestational surrogacy and artificial insemination are "exactly analogous in this crucial respect: Both contemplate the procreation of a child by the consent to a medical procedure of someone who intends to raise the child but who otherwise does not have any biological tie." Id. at 286. The court didn't like the idea of people who are responsible for the creation of a child "turning around and disclaiming any responsibility," id. at 287, after the child is born.
22. Id. at 289.
23. Id. at 291.
24. Id. at 292.
25. See id. at 292-293.
26. Id. at 293.
27. Id. at294n.22.
28. See Kass v. Kass, 696 N.E.2d 174 (N.Y. 1998).
29. Id. at 176-177.
30. Id. at 177.
31. Id. at 180.
32. Id. at 182. Contra A.Z. v. B.Z., 725 N.E.2d 1051 (Mass. 2000).
33. William Nicholson, Shadowlands (BBC Wales 1985).
34. It may be that the court missed this point because it adopted the language of the consent form and used the meaningless term "pre- zygote" instead of "embryo." Other clinics have used "pre-embryo," but virtually everyone has now abandoned the "pre" designation because of the realization that one could just as easily call the embryo a "pre-child" or a "pre-adult." Moreover, the real distinction is between preimplantation extracorporeal embryos, over which both male and female gamete providers have equal say, and implanted embryos, over which the pregnant woman has the ultimate decision-making authority herself. The terms employed are not irrelevant to the analysis, and thus, even though the court says that it is adopting the terms used in the consent form, in the opinion itself, the court uses three different terms for the same entities almost at random: embryos, fertilized eggs, and pre-zygotes.
35. Kass, 696 N.E.2d at 182.
36. See Robertson, supra note 7.
37. Kass, 696 N.E.2d at 178 n.2.
38. The Most impressive report to date has come to be known as the "Warnock Report." See Mary Warnock, Report of the Committee of Inquiry into Human Fertilisation and Embryology (1984).
39. N.Y. State Task Force on Life & Law, Assisted Reproductive Technologies: Analysis and Recommendations for Public Policy 351 (1998).
40. President's Council on Bioethics, Reproduction and Responsibility: The Regulation of New Biotechnologies 215 (2004).
41. See, e.g., Amelia Gentleman, India Nurtures Business of Surrogate Motherhood, N.Y. Times, Mar. 10, 2008, at A9;
42. Heather Won Tesoriero, Infertile Couples Head Overseas for Treatments, Wall St. J., Feb. 19, 2008, at Dl.
43. See generally George J. Annas, The ABCs of Global Governance of Embryonic Stem Cell Research: Arbitrage, Bioethics and Cloning, 39 New Eng. L. Rev. 489 (2005)
44. Rosario M. Isasi & George J. Annas, Arbitrage, Bioethics, and Cloning: The ABCs of Gestating a United Nations Cloning Convention, 35 Case W. Res. J. Int'l L. 397 (2003).
45. See George J. Annas & Sherman Elias, Politics, Morals and Embryos: Can Bioethics in the United States Rise Above Politics?, 431 Nature 19 (2004).
46. See George J. Annas, Genism, Racism, and the Prospect of Genetic Genocide, 6 Pac. Ecologist 43 (2003).
47. Nabokov, supra note 3, at 174.
48. See generally Silver, supra note 2;
49. Joel Garreau, Radical Evolution: The Promise and Peril of Enhancing our Minds, Our Bodies-and What It Means to Be Human (2004).
50. See generally George J. Annas, Lori B. Andrews & Rosario M. Isasi, Protecting the Endangered Human: Toward an International Treaty Prohibiting Cloning and Inheritable Alterations, 28 Am. J.L. & Med. 151 (2002). This article was updated in George J. Annas, American Bioethics: Crossing Human Rights and Health Law Boundaries 43-58 (2005).
51. See Annas, supra note 45, at 43-58.
52. But see John Harris, Enhancing Evolution: The Ethical Case for Making Better People (2007)
53. Engineering the Human Germline: An Exploration of the Science and Ethics of Altering the Genes We Pass to Our Children (Gregory Stock & John Campbell eds., 2000). James Watson has also consistently argued against any sort of international agreement on genetic engineering: I think it would be complete disaster to try and get an international agreement. 1 just can't imagine anything more stifling. You end up with the lowest possible denominator. Agreement among all the different religious groups would be impossible. About all they'd agree upon is that they should allow us to breath air... I think our hope is to stay away from regulations and laws whenever possible.
54. Engineering the Human Germline, supra, at 87.
55. See generally Rosario Isasi & George Annas, To Clone Alone: The United Nations Human Cloning Declaration, 24 Law & Hum. Genome Rev. 13 (2006).
56. O'Neill, supra note 5. at 171.