Iowa Republicans have introduced a bill that would criminalize the death of an ‘unborn person’ – including an embryo – in what critics say marks an escalating attack on IVF.
The new legislation, which still needs to pass the state Senate and be signed by Governor Kim Reynolds to become law, would impose a life sentence in prison on anyone found to have ’caused the death of an unborn person.’
The bill is likely to reach Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds’ desk for signage. It’s a prospect that has other lawmakers and activists on the ground bracing for a chaotic fallout that could include closing IVF clinics for fear of prosecution, similar to what happened in Alabama last month.
Iowa lawmakers did not say they intended to interfere in the IVF process, and the bill does not mention IVF at all. But it also does not provide protection for IVF, and a proposal to do so was withdrawn from the case.
Iowa Democratic Representative Beth Wessel-Kroeschell warned that the bill ‘puts IVF at risk, whether you want to believe it or not.’
The Iowa State House introduced a ‘feticide’ bill that would make the destruction of an ‘unborn person’, including an embryo, a felony. In Iowa, personhood begins the moment the egg is fertilized
Iowa’s bill specifically changed the language referring to termination of ‘human pregnancy’ to ‘the death of an unborn person.’
In Iowa, an embryo is considered an unborn person. In addition to Alabama, nine states — South Dakota, Arizona, Kansas, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Louisiana, Arkansas, Alabama and Texas — define life as beginning at conception, and if Iowa and Alabama are true clocks, any of those states would be able be next to limit IVF in some way.
The current language The Iowa bill states: ‘A person who … causes the death of an unborn person without the consent of the pregnant person is guilty of a Class “A” felony.’
It also says: ‘A person who unintentionally causes the death of an unborn person … is guilty of a Class “B” felony’, punishable by up to 25 years in prison.
Rep. Wessel-Kroeschell said the bill could create the ‘same chaos’ for IVF services in Iowa as happened in Alabama last month — after the state Supreme Court ruled embryos had the same legal protections as fully formed humans.
Republican Representative Skyler Wheeler, who co-sponsored the bill, said it was only intended to increase the penalties for killing a mother and her unborn baby, adding that his fellow lawmakers are ‘trying to turn this into another discussion.
He rejected comparisons to the Alabama ruling, saying: ‘This bill should have taken two minutes. Sometimes you hear things and you see things and you just – you can’t wrap your head around the madness.’
Meanwhile, Rep. called. Jennifer Konfrst, the Democratic Minority Leader of the Iowa State House, that for an Alabama-style bill. She told NBC News: ‘Iowa Republicans will stop at nothing to ban abortion, even if it means criminalizing people who undergo IVF treatments.’
The Alabama ruling had a chilling effect on IVF practitioners and patients desperate to become mothers.
The ruling itself held that embryos created through in vitro fertilization (IVF) should be considered children, and that destroying unused embryos would violate the 1872 Wrongful Death of a Minor Act.
Gabby Goidel (shown right next to her husband) was days away from an egg retrieval when the Alabama verdict came down. Nervous about what this would mean for her chances of having a baby, she and her husband packed up and headed to Texas for IVF treatment
Amanda Zurawski, 36 from Texas (pictured right with her husband) has chosen to move her frozen embryos out of state for fear that her state could follow Alabama’s lead and block her from starting a family on her terms
During the normal IVF process, a doctor harvests anywhere from eight to 15 eggs from a woman’s ovaries and manually combines them with sperm in a laboratory for fertilization.
However, not all embryos develop. Embryos may have chromosomal abnormalities or genetic mutations that prevent them from developing normally.
Also, some embryos may have the necessary genetic makeup to develop into healthy fetuses, while others may not. Embryos that are not implanted in a uterus are typically frozen or destroyed.
But suddenly, fearful of prosecution, IVF clinics in Alabama temporarily halted services and told anxious moms-to-be to sit tight.
One of those patients was Gabby Goidel of Alabama, who was just days away from her egg retrieval when the state court decision came down. She and her husband frantically called other providers in the state but could not find another provider. Eventually they packed their bags and headed to Texas.
Mrs Goidel, who has an unexplained genetic fertility problem, said: ‘Most of our embryos will not be genetically normal.
‘My hope would be that we could let these embryos pass naturally, but now it’s, “should we save them?” I don’t necessarily want to implant a child that I know is going to miscarry.’
According to Heather Williams, president of the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, an influential organization dedicated to electing Democrats to state legislatures, Iowa’s bill following the Alabama court’s decision is symptomatic of major efforts to undermine women’s bodily autonomy.
Ms. Williams said: ‘In a country full of Republican lawmakers trying to outdo each other in rolling back basic freedoms, this Iowa law shows that what happened in Alabama last month won’t stay in just one state.
‘Protecting IVF and other reproductive freedoms should be the law of the land. Once again, Republicans are not slowing down their attacks on women and reproductive rights.’
At the same time, Amanda Zurawski, 36, from Texas, has chosen to move her frozen embryos out of state for fear that lawmakers could follow Alabama’s lead and block her from starting a family on her terms.
She said the process of IVF is anxiety-inducing enough on its own, but the ruling and the subsequent closing of some clinics in Alabama have added “another layer of fear and anxiety.”