We have the technology to use sperm, and potentially eggs, from dead people to make embryos, and eventually babies. When the person who provided those cells dies, like Peter, who gets to decide what to do with them?
In theory, the decision should be made by the person who provided the eggs, sperm or embryos.
Someone who might be trying for a baby with their partner may store their sex cells or embryos and sign a form stating that they are happy for their partner to use these cells if they die, for example.
Partners and family members who want to use the cells might have to collect evidence to convince a court the deceased person ...
...really did want to have children. But there is some degree of legal ownership for the people who provided the cells.
“The law in this area makes my head hurt,” he said. The law varies depending on where you are, too.
Some states won’t legally recognize a child conceived after a person’s death as that person’s offspring, according to the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM).
“We do not have any national rules or policies,” Gwendolyn Quinn, a bioethicist at New York University, tells me.
The concern is that these relatives might be hoping for a “commemorative child” or as “a symbolic replacement of the deceased.”