Divergent views on start of human life

Two committees - the Bioethics Consultative Committee and Parliament's Social Affairs Committee - do not share the Church's view that human life begins at the moment of penetration of the sperm into the ovum, but both believe that life starts a few hours later.

On Tuesday, the Bioethics Consultative Committee unanimously agreed that life begins when there is the mingling of the mother's and father's chromosomes - amphimixes - which creates a human embryo.

This stand is very similar to that held by Parliament's Social Affairs Committee, which for over eight months intensely discussed bioethics and issued its recommendations last week.

In fact, in its recommendations on the use of biotechnology, genetic technology and assisted fertilisation, the parliamentary committee proposed a law which gives the embryo a moral and legal status not later than the phase of conception, which is when the two nuclei of the sperm and the egg fuse to form the single cell of a new human life.

On the other hand, in a statement earlier this month, the Maltese bishops said that from the moral aspect, the fecundated egg has to be respected and treated as a human person from the moment of penetration of the spermatozoon.

Contacted by The Times, Bioethics Consultative Committee chairman Michael Asciak said the committee's decision was based purely on scientific evidence and did not go into the moral aspect. He explained that the committee examined the latest scientific information and he believed that science pointed toward the moment of amphimixes as the start of human life. This takes place between 14 and 24 hours from when the sperm penetrates the egg.

The technical definition is that "the coalescence of the homologous chromosomes of the two pronuclei after their nuclear envelopes break down, leads to the formation of the zygote which is a unicellular embryo".

"By this definition, the BCC affirms in its opinion, with the scientific data available to it at this point, that human life starts at amphimixis," he said.

In a recent opinion column in The Times, Prof. Maurice Cauchi - the former chairman of the Bioethics Consultative Committee - said it was very clear that it took several hours between the initial process of contact and penetration of sperm into the ovum and the final event, when there is a single cell containing the integrated DNA from both parents.

He said the dignity due to a human embryo should be extended to the "very earliest time" when syngamy (when sperm and ovum become one functional unit) has taken place. However, he said, it should not necessarily be earlier, in the first few hours after sperm meets ovum and prior to syngamy.

Asked for his comments, bioethicist Pierre Mallia said accepting that human life started at amphimixis was "a good compromise".

The parliamentary committee also discussed in vitro fertilisation. Since it did not reach an agreement as to who can be offered IVF, it made two choices in its recommendations - that IVF should be offered to married heterosexual couples, or to heterosexual couples who although not married have a stable relationship. Mr Puli said it was now up to Parliament to take a position on this.

The committee also failed to reach an agreement on the freezing of embryos. The recommendations also allow for two choices, the first being that they should not be stored to be used later, unless the mother gets sick after fertilisation.

On the other hand, the committee is also giving Parliament the choice of deciding that embryos can be stored in a way that does not damage them so they can be implanted in the mother's womb at a later date.

With regard to freezing, Dr Mallia said there have been a lot of misconceptions, even from the side of the Church. He said it was positive that the recommendations leave an opening for the acceptance of freezing.

He said some centres abroad freeze a few embryos, so that the woman does not have to go through the whole process of extracting eggs from her, over and over again. However, he said, the parents needed to be committed to make attempts to implant the embryos later on.

He deemed as very positive the acceptance of Polar Body Biopsy (tests on the DNA from the ovum), which the committee recommended should be acceptable in cases of serious diseases. During his presentation to the Social Affairs Committee, Dr Mallia had emphasised that a number of couples had certain medical conditions running in their family which could be eliminated if the fertilised eggs made through an IVF process were tested before being implanted in the mother's womb.

He said the issue should be made more clear, with a list of the diseases covered being drafted. He added that in this case, IVF should be offered to couples who are not infertile, but have these diseases running in their family.

He voiced his disagreement, however, with the recommendation that the law banning abortion in Malta should be entrenched in the Constitution. He said although he had nothing against the banning of abortion, he had his reservations against the entrenchment if this could hinder the process of IVF.

"Some people say that IVF is abortive because there is a loss of embryos. But this also happens in natural conception, when around 80 per cent of fertilised eggs are lost," he said, adding that around 85 per cent of eggs fertilised through IVF do not make it.

"If the abortion law is entrenched in the Constitution, it has to be ensured that it does not hinder IVF," he said.

Social Affairs Committee chairman Clyde Puli explained that the recommendations will now be passed on to Parliament and to the government, after which the government will draft a law, which would be discussed in Parliament.