“You can’t have that both ways,” Christina Bohannan said during an online news conference on Thursday.
Bohannan, the Democratic candidate challenging two-term incumbent Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks in Iowa’s 1st Congressional District, was referring to the “backtracking” some politicians are doing following a decision by the Alabama Supreme Court declaring that embryos have all the rights of any child in that state from the moment an ova is fertilized.
That ruling came in a lawsuit brought by three infertile couples who underwent in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment. All the treatments were successful. As is standard in IVF treatment, more ova were fertilized than those that were successfully implanted, and those spare fertilized eggs were kept in cryogenic storage. In December 2020, an erratic patient unrelated to the couples grabbed some containers of fertilized eggs from the storage unit, then dropped them on the floor. The eggs were damaged and the clinic disposed of them.
The couples sued the clinic under Alabama’s Wrongful Death of a Minor Act, alleging the clinic failed to adequately protect the fertilized eggs. In its Feb. 16 ruling, the state Supreme Court found an Alabama law granting “personhood” to human eggs as soon as they are fertilized, which took effect after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, means there is no legal distinction between a fertilized egg and any child under 18 in the state, so the couples’ lawsuit can proceed.
After the ruling was announced, all IVF clinics in Alabama suspended their activities. And around the country, politicians who had previously declared they believe life begins at fertilization and embryos should have all the rights accorded to any minor are now saying they never intended the personhood bills they supported to interfere with IVF treatments.
Bohannan pointed to Miller-Meeks as one of those politicians.
“I have been supportive of IVF,” Miller-Meeks told constituents at a meeting in Pella on Monday, in response to a question about the Alabama ruling.
But in 2021, Miller-Meeks was one of 166 Republican members of the House of Representative to co-sponsor the Life Begins at Conception Act, which would have given fertilized eggs full rights nationwide with no exemptions.
“That would make IVF impossible,” Bohannan said during the news conference held over Zoom.
“I think that it’s frankly outrageous that people who claim to care about people and families and children would sign onto a bill like this,” Bohannan, who ran unsuccessfully against Miller-Meeks in 2022, said.
Bohannan also talked about her personal experience with IVF in an unsuccessful attempt to have a second child.
“It is a tough process,” she said. “I don’t think anybody would say otherwise. Physically, emotionally, financially, it can be a difficult process.”
“Anybody who would deny that hope, who would deny the chance at a family, should not say that they represent families in the state legislature or in Congress,” Bohannan continued.
Asked by a reporter if people should believe Miller-Meeks’ statement that she supports IVF, Bohannan replied, “I think actions speak way louder than words. And she co-sponsored the life-at-conception bill that would make it impossible to do IVF, that creates ‘personhood’ at the moment of conception with no exceptions at all.”
Bohannan explained that the version of the bill Republicans in the U.S. Senate proposed did contain a provision protecting IVF treatment, but House members chose not to include one.
“You can’t have that both ways,” she said. “It’s very clear what the effects of [personhood bills] will be. So what we are seeing right now is a lot politicians who went really far down this road of ‘life at conception,’ voting no on contraception, eliminating all abortions across the country with no exceptions — that’s exactly what that bill does — and then, now that it’s become politically difficult for them… we see them trying to backtrack, trying to backpedal, trying to co-sponsor bills that seem like they’re trying to support women or support choice or support birth control, when those bills that they’re sponsoring really do absolutely nothing to protect that.”
Joining Bohannan in the news conference was Dr. Amy Sparks, director of the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics’ In Vitro Fertilization and Reproductive Testing Laboratories and clinical assistant professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology – Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility at Carver College of Medicine. Sparks said she was not speaking on behalf of the UIHC or Carver, but on behalf of embryologists and infertility care providers “across the United States” and as the former president of the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology.
“And I can tell you as an embryologist, a mother and grandmother, there are enormous biological differences between a baby and a fertilized egg,” Sparks said. “The law needs to recognize those differences.”
“As individuals responsible for the handling and storage of the frozen embryos, we now face uncertainty, ethical dilemmas and potentially serious legal ramifications surrounding our day-to-day professional practices,” Sparks said. “I can assure you this weighs heavily on our minds as we strive to provide the best evidence-based care to our patients, who are so desperately seeking to have children.”
Sparks said she supported a bill introduced in the U.S. Senate to protect access to IVF treatments by Illinois Democrat Tammy Duckworth. A threatened Republican filibuster earlier this week killed any progress on the legislation.
The Alabama decision and the possibility courts in other states might reach similar conclusions weigh heavily on the minds of those providing IVF care, Sparks said.
“I have to say this morning I was reflecting on this as I was checking eggs for fertilization,” she recalled. “You have to appreciate I’m pipetting an egg that is 0.1 millimeters. There’s also a chance it’s going to get stuck on that pipette, or perhaps I’m going to crack the shell — there is a soft shell around the egg. Am I going to go to jail for that?”
“That’s a heavy question, because I’m trying to do the best for our patients, but if I’m going to be liable to that level, I don’t know how many of us would be able to continue to do this work.”
“Infertility is bipartisan,” Bohannan said. “I have friends and family members who have suffered with infertility. Some have had real success with IVF, which is so wonderful to see, and some Republicans, some are Democrats. This should not be a political issue. We should not be playing political games with this issue.”
