WHAT DO THEY DO WITH THE EMBRYOS?: From the Associated Press, via Amy Welborn. Excerpts:

In a survey believed to be the first of its kind, 217 in vitro fertilization clinics across the country described the variety of methods they use to dispose of the frozen clusters of cells, which are the size of a dot and incapable of living outside a mother’s womb.

The reverence that some clinics gave to the task surprised researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and Rutgers University.

Seven clinics said they performed a quasi-religious ceremony, including a prayer, for each embryo they destroyed.

Seven others took the technically unnecessary step of culturing the cells in a lab dish, then allowing them to multiply on their own, briefly, before they perish–a procedure that gives nature the final role in determining the embryos’ fate.

Four insisted that, whatever method was chosen for disposal, the patient be present when it happens. Others barred them from being in the room, or recommended that they be uninvolved in the process.



Four clinics said they gave the thawed embryos back to their clients. …

Seven clinics, or about three percent of all that participated in the study, said that because of religious or ethical concerns, they would not create more embryos than they intended to implant, and thus had no cells to freeze or destroy.

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