Modern Pregnancies and (Im)Perfect Babies

Kraft, Stephanie A.

doi:10.1080/15265161.2016.1266892

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 9 publications

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“…It is, for example, argued that possible restrictions to fetal WES/WGS should be a professional responsibility rather than a governmental one (Berkman and Bayefsky 2017 ). Many commentators agree that further unbalanced adherence to the reproductive autonomy paradigm on behalf of health care professionals would put too much responsibility and burden on pregnant women and their partners, or even might be abused for illegitimate decisions to terminate a pregnancy on eugenic grounds or for fetal sex selection (Henn 2000 ; Kraft 2017 ; Mozersky and Sankar 2017 ). New clinical care pathways in this extremely complex field of prenatal genomic medicine will have to better distribute responsibilities among all agents involved.…”

Section: Corresponding Ethical Challengesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The fetus in the age of the genome

Schmitz

Henn

2021

Hum Genet

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Due to a number of recent achievements, the field of prenatal medicine is now on the verge of a profound transformation into prenatal genomic medicine. This transformation is expected to not only substantially expand the spectrum of prenatal diagnostic and screening possibilities, but finally also to advance fetal care and the prenatal management of certain fetal diseases and malformations. It will come along with new and profound challenges for the normative framework and clinical care pathways in prenatal (and reproductive) medicine. To adequately address the potential ethically challenging aspects without discarding the obvious benefits, several agents are required to engage in different debates. The permissibility of the sequencing of the whole fetal exome or genome will have to be examined from a philosophical and legal point of view, in particular with regard to conflicts with potential rights of future children. A second requirement is a societal debate on the question of priority setting and justice in relation to prenatal genomic testing. Third, a professional-ethical debate and positioning on the goal of prenatal genomic testing and a consequential re-structuring of clinical care pathways seems to be important. In all these efforts, it might be helpful to envisage the unborn rather not as a fetus, not as a separate moral subject and a second “patient”, but in its unique physical connection with the pregnant woman, and to accept the moral quandaries implicitly given in this situation.

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Section: Corresponding Ethical Challengesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The fetus in the age of the genome

Schmitz

Henn

2021

Hum Genet

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A Capabilities Approach to Prenatal Screening for Fetal Abnormalities

et al. 2019

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International guidelines recommend that prenatal screening for fetal abnormalities should only be offered within a non-directive framework aimed at enabling women in making meaningful reproductive choices. Whilst this position is widely endorsed, developments in cell-free fetal DNA based Non-Invasive Prenatal Testing are now raising questions about its continued suitability for guiding screening policy and practice. This issue is most apparent within debates on the scope of the screening offer. Implied by the aim of enabling meaningful reproductive choices is the idea that screening services should support women in accessing prenatal tests that best enable them to realize the types of reproductive choice that they find important. However, beyond whatever options meet the quality standards required for facilitating an informed decision, the remaining criteria of facilitating autonomous choice is strictly non-directive. As a result, policy makers receive little indication prior to consultation with each individual woman, about what conditions should be prioritized during the offer of screening. In this paper we try to address this issue by using the capabilities approach to further specify the non-directive aim of enabling meaningful reproductive choice. The resulting framework is then used to assess the relative importance of offering prenatal screening where concerning different types of genetic condition. We conclude that greater priority may be ascribed to offering prenatal screening for conditions that more significantly diminish a woman's central capabilities. It follows that serious congenital and earlier-onset conditions are more likely to fulfill these criteria.

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Modern Pregnancies and (Im)Perfect Babies

Cited by 2 publications

References 9 publications

The fetus in the age of the genome

The fetus in the age of the genome

A Capabilities Approach to Prenatal Screening for Fetal Abnormalities

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