Approach two: ‘Life is a gift’

For people who support approach two: ‘life is a gift’, life is not something we should be trying to control. Trying to control the sort of babies we have interferes with what is natural and could have unintended and unwanted consequences.

The ‘life is a gift’ approach says we should be developing ways to make sure all children have the best chance to reach their potential. This can be achieved by supporting parents and caregivers. This approach would embody our most important values: love, respect for all human life, and care of our most vulnerable people.

Supporters of approach two: ‘life is a gift’ say that pre-birth testing is based on an assumption that the life of a person with a disability has less value than the life of a person who does not. They are concerned that screening and testing will reduce the overall numbers of people with disabilities.

People who support approach two may think it immoral to discard embryos or abort foetuses on the basis of pre-birth tests. This might be because they believe embryos and foetuses have souls.

It could also be based on what they say is a ‘biological fact’ – that at conception, when the two halves of the human genetic material combine, a new individual is formed with its own unique DNA, and organised development begins.

Some think it’s wrong to destroy embryos and foetuses because they have a right to life, the same rights as any person. From this perspective, destroying an unborn child is the same as murder.

Some view pre-birth testing in terms of the context that God made us and the world around us. For people who believe this, pre-birth testing goes against what is God-given.

Supporters of approach two: ‘life is a gift’, sometimes describe pre-birth testing as a ‘search and destroy mission’ because the underlying assumption of testing is that affected embryos or foetuses will be destroyed.

Some people say this bias is built into our medical systems and is reflected in the fact that in New Zealand today mothers / parents choose to abort over 90% of the foetuses that test positively for Down syndrome.

Some people fear that testing foetuses for conditions such as Down syndrome in national screening programmes would be a form of eugenics. These sorts of programmes are likely to significantly reduce the number of people in our society with conditions such as Down syndrome.

Another concern is that pre-birth testing interferes with Nature and could result in unintended and unwanted consequences. For example, pre-birth testing could reduce the genetic diversity of the human species.

Not all pre-birth tests are completely safe. For example, amniocentesis can cause infections and miscarriages. Some people question whether removing 1 or 2 cells for PGD from a 6- or 8-cell embryo might harm it.

Recent research indicates that embryos might not implant as well in a woman after PGD. It is not yet known whether there will be longer-term impacts, so the results of this ‘experiment’ won’t be known for a generation or two.

For many people, there is more to human ‘health’ than medical conditions. More broadly, ‘health’ includes factors such as society’s attitudes to disabled people and about how we think about bringing children into the world.

What can be done?

Supporters of the ‘life is a gift’ approach generally favour the following actions:

• allow testing that benefits the mother or helps parents prepare for a child, as long as embryos are not discarded and foetuses are not aborted
• require that every IVF embryo be transferred into a women’s uterus at some stage, with the intention that it will implant and develop into a baby
• review the capacity of the support services for people with illnesses, diseases and physical disorders
• provide adequate government support and funding to people who care for disabled persons
• provide adequate levels of government-funded respite care to family members who care for disabled relatives
• provide the infrastructure so that disabled people can participate fully in our society.
• provide opportunities for people to develop the ability to make moral judgements about complex issues.

For and against the approach ‘life is a gift’

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