Fertility loans clash with faith advice on procreation

 Two interesting articles on the issue of infertility and the finance industry show the need for oversight.

The first one is from the WSJ.    It talks about the loan industry that has been built up around financing the expensive treatments that couples or singles will undertake the get pregnant. Are doctors doing their patients a service to introduce them to finance companies that will loan them money for fertility treatments or do they see this as a way to boost their own  "production." Is this bad? After all they are businessmen/women. Why would they not want their practice to thrive?

"At a time when many traditional lenders are struggling, companies that join forces with doctors to make loans for in vitro fertilization, egg harvesting and other fertility treatments say their business is thriving.

Some doctors won't offer the loans. Others worry that doctors who invest their own money in fertility-finance companies will push the loans on patients."

Some doctors set up kiosks in their offices where patients could apply for the bank's loans.

Would the dr. have such an interest in these loans that they adjust their medical practices?

Also contentious are refund programs that offer money back if in vitro fertilization fails and patients don't take a baby home. One of IntegraMed programs refunds 70% of the $24,000 sticker price for a package of six IVF treatments if they all fail. If the first treatment works, the borrower still owes the entire $24,000, resulting in a larger profit for clinics.

The Catholic Church continues to take the opposite  view of IVF and fertility treatments that interfere with the husband/wife conjugal arrangement.

"The pope pressed the church ban against artificial procreation, saying infertile couples should refrain from any method to try to conceive other than sex between husband and wife.

"The human and Christian dignity of procreation, in fact, doesn’t consist in a 'product,' but in its link to the conjugal act, an expression of the love of the spouses of their union, not only biological but also spiritual," Benedict said.

Sperm or egg donation and methods such as in vitro fertilization are banned by the church for its faithful.

The emphasis on science "and the logic of profit seem today to dominate the field of infertility and human procreation," the pope said."

There is such a lack of regulation around this industry that any offshoot industry  like fertility loans have the potential for abuse of couples who are so eager for offspring that they will let their emotions override their principles and usual  precautions.  Then there are the intended consequences of IVF such as spelled out in the book Inconceivable when a  a dr.  mistakenly  implanted another woman's embryo during a treatment.

 

Grandmother and Grandson Having Baby Together

When I first read this I thought that the grandson might have had a sex change operation or something..... who knows these days.....but this is too much. I guess anything goes...listen to their reasoning....I just reread  the story and it is unclear...at least to me...how this pregnancy via the surrogate is going to happen. Clearly at 72, the eggs of the grandmother are past their prime. Perhaps the grandson is going to inseminate the surrogate...anyway I think this is a sick story of two people who are very toubled and if they want to have a sexual relationship, I wish they would not bring a child into the world. What are they trying to prove?
Susie

 

By Bob Ellis on April 30th, 2010

From Dakotavoice.com

British newspaper  The Sun reports on a couple from Indiana, 72 year old Pearl Carter and 26 year old Phil Bailey, are having a sexual relationship and plan to have a child together through a surrogate mother.

No, we haven’t even begun to scratch the surface of how bizarre and ill-advised this relationship is.

Carter and Baily are grandmother and grandson, respectively.

The Sun explains how this whole thing came together:

Phil is the son of Pearl’s daughter Lynette Bailey — who the pensioner put up for adoption when she was just 18.

When Lynette died, Phil tracked down his long lost gran — 46 years his senior — and they started their strange relationship.

Pearl added: “From the first moment that I saw him, I knew we would never have a grandmother-grandson relationship. For the first time in years I felt sexually alive.”

The pair spent their first week together shopping, bowling and eating out. During the second week, giggly on wine after a night out, Pearl decided she wasn’t going to deny her feelings anymore.

Pearl said: “I called Phil into my bedroom, sat him on the bed, and then I leant over and kissed him.

“I expected rejection but instead he kissed me back.”

Phil said he had the same feelings towards Pearl.

He revealed: “I wanted to kiss her there and then. My feelings were overwhelming.

“I love Pearl with all my heart. I’ve always been attracted to older women and I think Pearl is gorgeous. Now I’m going to be a dad and I can’t wait.

“Yes, we get laughed at and bullied when we go out and kiss in public but we don’t care. You can’t help who you fall for.”

So you think it is wrong for a grandmother and her grandson to have a sexual relationship? What kind of prude are you?  Why are you being so judgmental?  Who gave you the right to judge them?  They are slaves to their emotions and impulses.  They can’t help who they have affection for!  They are in love!  That is all that matters.  They were probably born this way (albeit 46 years apart)!

In fact, Pearl has clinical authority which confirms to her that it isn’t wrong!

Pearl says the relationship is not wrong after a friend told her about Genetic Sexual Attraction (GSA) syndrome, which occurs when close relatives meet as adults and find they are attracted to each other.

She said: “I could now understand my feelings and realize they weren’t wrong.”

So you see, Pearl and Phil now have clinical sanction for their unusual union.  Who are we to judge this odd relationship?  After all, someone with a degree has pronounced it “Okay.”