The hospital system said it is pausing IVF treatments to “evaluate the potential that our patients and our physicians could be prosecuted criminally.”
Topline
The University of Alabama at Birmingham health system is pausing in vitro fertilization treatments so it can evaluate potential consequences for giving treatment after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that a frozen embryo is a human.Key Facts
The treatments are paused as the hospital system evaluates “the potential that our patients and our physicians could be prosecuted criminally or face punitive damages for following the standard of care for IVF treatments,” spokesperson Savannah Koplon said in a statement to Forbes.
In vitro fertilization, or IVF, is a process in which doctors extract eggs and fertilize them outside of the body to create embryos that can be placed back in the uterus, and while “egg fertilization and embryo development” are paused, Koplon said, UAB clinics are still able to do the steps “through egg retrieval.
