Pick one: IVF kids (a) are healthy (b) are unhealthy (c) have no extra heads.
With all the talk on here about artificial insemination lately, I thought I’d throw this brief article in too.
by Jared Yee
Confused by claims and counter-claims about climate change? Can’t decide whether it’s your patriotic duty to be a sceptic or a true believer? Well, you have it easy. How about deciding whether IVF is good for a baby’s health or not? Three similar, but conflicting stories appeared in the media this week.
“Babies born by in vitro fertilization (IVF) do not face an increased risk of birth defects, nor are they at greater risk of being smaller than normal, according to a study conducted in Japan.” This comes from the American journal Fertility and Sterility. However, it found that 5 percent of IVF developed placenta previa, compared to 1.5 percent of the women who conceived naturally.
Women who have fertility treatment are four times more likely to have a stillborn baby than those who conceive naturally, reported the Guardian about a Danish study.
And Belgian researchers found that IVF children are generally as healthy as naturally conceived children but tend to be lower in birth weight and have slightly more genetic differences. “By and large, the kids are just fine. It’s not like the kids have extra arms or extra heads or anything,” says Carmen Sapienza, a geneticist at Temple University in Philadelphia.
How is a layman to reconcile these conflicting reports? Any ideas?
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