Lately, the problem of infertility became quite pressing. Many couples in the US and abroad discovered that they have troubles with the conception of a child – the fact which does not stimulate family happiness at all accounts. Assisted reproductive technologies were developed to help couples have biological children as a result of surgery and laboratory manipulations. In the 1970s, British doctors began treating infertility by removing women’s eggs and fertilizing them in the laboratory. In vitro fertilization remains to be one of the most popular reproductive technologies used these days.
The concept of reproductive rights wasrr first mentioned at the UN International Conference on Human Rights held in Teheran in 1968. Under the proclamation of Teheran, parents have a basic right to decide how many children they would like to have and when they want them to come. Today women’s reproductive rights include safe adoption, birth control, sexual education, and proper reproductive health care. Parents have freedom in their family planning and bare responsibility for their sexual activity. Reproductive rights secured by the UN declaration are universal and work regardless of cultural and religious issues.
Assisted reproductive technologies are fully legal and mostly safe for parents-to-be. They include in vitro fertilization, intracytoplasmic sperm injection, using donor’s eggs and surrogate mothers. Nevertheless, fertility treatment is expensive. Under the Affordable Care Act, all insured women are eligible to services which prevent unplanned pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. However, fertility investigations and treatments are not covered by insurance.