Nationalist MP Jean-Pierre Farrugia has cautioned against watering down the IVF law any more than it has already been diluted.
Dr Farrugia, who chaired a parliamentary committee to propose a legal framework for IVF, said he had no difficulty making his committee’s proposals more restrictive in light of new technology. But, according to him, a country that “aspires for excellence in health” can definitely not make it any more “restrictive”.
The Times yesterday reported that Parliament’s Social Affairs Committee has ended its discussions on IVF without resolving whether egg freezing (oocyte vitrification) is preferable to embryo freezing.
Reacting to the committee’s decision to pass the buck to the government and the latest submissions by a lobby group against embryo freezing, Dr Farrugia said: “This (law) is not liberal at all. It would have been liberal if it included gamete donation, eligibility for single persons or gay couples, surrogacy, pre-implantation genetic diagnosis... all situations which were excluded by the select committee I chaired and was concluded nine months ago.”
Dr Farrugia explained that his committee had initially seen embryo freezing as the best option because, until last year, eggs were much less resilient to freezing. But during a congress in Rome it was shown that, with the use of vitrification, eggs could be as resilient as embryos.
He warned, however, that to have at least two embryos (the ideal number), three or four eggs must be fertilised, which could result in between zero and four embryos.
Maltese paediatricians agree that a maximum of two embryos should be transferred for best results. So if more than two embryos are formed, there needs to be a system of freezing. Dr Farrugia quoted former Children’s Commissioner Carmen Zammit who said these embryos would have been created “inevitably” due to the uncertainty of the process and not with the premeditated intention to have more than two embryos.
Dr Farrugia said embryo freezing should be permitted in these cases and not restricted only to “grave” cases, such as if a woman was injured or had second thoughts about transferring the embryos. This is the restriction a lobby group against embryo freezing would like to see. The Professionals Against Embryo Freezing said the Social Affairs Committee agreed with having embryo protection right from fertilisation and that couples undergoing the “gruelling” IVF treatment should have proper support from qualified counsellors.
“Many couples suffer because they do not have this psychological back-up and the informed consent is not really informed as couples are painted a pretty picture and do not really know what they are going in for.” The group claimed there was “never” any agreement on embryo freezing as an option of IVF and the debate was reopened due to this disagreement.
“The embryo has a right to life and should not be subjected to manipulation and freezing,” the lobby group said, adding it had more than 200 professionals in its fold, including the midwives’ association.
“Embryo freezing is not needed as an option of treatment. Working with oocytes rather than embryos avoids the legal, ethical, moral and religious issues.” However, embryo freezing in the unforeseen “grave emergency” was different, the lobby said, adding that if something serious prevented a woman from having embryos transferred (such as an accident), the embryos could be frozen “until the woman recovers”.