Dangers and costs of the in vitro procedure

Wanda Terlecka

On the global scale, including Poland, before the eyes of the world, a gigantic medical experiment including human being is done for dozens years, which is called the procedure in vitro.

In vitro - a medical experiment

Despite generally defined rules of good clinical practice (GCP) this experiment violates the most important basic rules of the experiment including the human being.

1. An experiment is done on the human being who is not able ( because he is too young) to learn the rules of this experiment, is not able to express his conscious consent to his participation in it or refuse it, is not able to defend himself against the forced participation in this experiment.

2. This experiment is generally done despite the fact that potential benefits (minimal probability of being born as healthy and without any disorders caused by the manipulations at the very beginning oh his life) are radically lower than obvious risk of losing the life for the constraint participant of the experiment (the man in the first stages of his life). This experiment done on hundreds millions of people who are made to exist behind the laboratory glass is called a method for treating infertility, which is an obvious untruth. Despite such numerous experiments, neither of them has cured any woman, any man or any infertile couple of infertility. It is difficult to speak about infertility as a disease. It results from many diseases.

The contemporary human fertility versus demography

Infertility is not the same as childlessness. A large part of the contemporary people at the age of reproduction, especially young people, consciously and willingly deprive themselves of fertility for some time, by using contraceptives. A significant number of young people consciously and willingly put off their decision of conceiving a baby for later years (after making career and making fortune), when the natural fertility decreases. Both in Poland and other developed countries the reproductive capability among people is decreasing. We register the negative natural growth, which means that more Poles are dying than are getting born. In the nearest decades (already in the 30s of the present century) there will be a problem of keeping the aging and ill society by its young members. The male fertility is getting worse gradually and systematically throughout years (because of many factors and not completely diagnosed). The whole Polish society is getting poorer in number. Bigger and bigger percent of Poles, including inhabitants of Czestochowa, live on the verge of poverty or below it, which is going to deepen in the coming year 2012. In this situation the representatives of the 'procreative industry' of different jobs, including doctors with professor degree, launch the procedure in vitro during all forums and using unacceptable forms among adults: emotional blackmail, falsifying facts, lies, concealing uncomfortable reality, concealing their financial interests connected with the 'procreative industry'. In Poland there are about 35 private centers performing the procedure in vitro and, apart from them, gynaecological clinics do that as well as some hospitals of a high opinion, that is, those where all expensive procedures are paid by NFZ (National Health Service). Couples are easily qualified to the procedure in vitro, also young couples who do not meet the medical criteria of infertility, sometimes after only six months of unsuccessful attempts of natural conceiving a baby, whereas two years of observation as well as a necessary specialist diagnosis are needed to get to know fully about the procreative health of a couple. In a medical centre of infertility treatment through the method of natro-technology in Ireland, 33 percents of children were born among the couples in which the in vitro method had been unsuccessfully used.

A risk of health, procedures in vitro and its effectiveness

A couple, including a potential mother, are not usually informed enough or sincerely about a risk or complications connected with the procedure in vitro for them and their children. A potential mother must undergo frequent shocking doses of hormones, the so-called hyper-stimulation of hormones. Every woman who has undergone it, is more likely to get nipple cancer and/or ovary cancer. Each of them can have a serious complication in the form of ovarian hyper-stimulation syndrome accompanied by damages of many organs. The procedure in vitro is performed at the time of a woman's cycle of fertility. Matured egg cells are not often obtained during one cycle. The hyper-stimulation is usually repeated 3-5 times in order to obtain 6-15 matured egg cells. After laparotomy, each of them is connected with spermatozoon in the laboratory glass, obtaining about 6-8 embryos of a specific human couple. An embryologist, not always a doctor, usually chooses roughly two of them which are the best ones for him and puts them into the cavity of the womb and freezes the other which are lively in liquid nitrogen. So what is the psychical comfort of parents, especially mother who is worried about the fate of the implanted children in her womb and prefers not to think about her frozen children?
Effectiveness in percents of in vitro, understood as a probability of getting pregnant, is in the world statistics 21-26%, in Poland it is 25-35% (which must be treated with distance). 5-7.5% of lively children have a chance to get born from the implanted developing embryos and fetuses. The rest of them do not experience the prenatal period in different stages of their development. All in vitro pregnancies are treated as pregnancies of high risk. 51% of them are multiple pregnancies, the twin pregnancies, at least. Most of them finish with a premature delivery, performed by different methods, which is another risk for a mother and a baby. The risk of deadly births is 4 times higher than in natural pregnancies. Perinatal death rate is twice higher than among babies conceived naturally. Babies of in vitro get born with their low birth weight 2, 6 times more frequently from a single pregnancy and more frequently from a multiple pregnancy. The low birth weight is one of the important risk factors of the appearance of cardiovascular diseases at the adult age. Birth defects among children of in vitro appear twice more frequently than among children who were conceived in natural conditions (serious heart defects, defects of kidneys, digestion system - the overgrowth of the esophagus, anus, cleft lips and/or cleft palate). There are serious rare genetically conditioned microdeletions syndromes 5 -9 times more frequent which appear with the mental handicap and cancers. Almost only children of in vitro have serious cancer of their eyes, retinoblastoma. Children of in vitro suffer from cerebral palsy 1.5 times more. It is reported that surgeries of different kinds are performed twice more frequently among children till the age of 5. Children of in vitro are more vulnerable to illnesses at their matured age, like hypertension, coronary disease, diabetics of the type 2, osteoporosis and obesity. Various factors of in vitro are one of the reasons for molecular disorders leading to the appearance of several thousands 'rare' genetic human defects, including the infertility. Children conceived in vitro do not receive medical documents of the procedure. The risk of the procedure in vitro looks in this way from the medical point of view. For the majority of children conceived inside the glass die in different stages or is destroyed mainly be freezing after various period of its duration.
Polish children destroyed in this way or existing in freezers could populate 1-2 towns of Częstochowa size.

The costs of the procedure in vitro

Without stopping over the moral, psychological and social costs, it is worth getting to know financial costs of the procedure in vitro.
These are direct and secondary costs. The average direct cost of the procedure in vitro in one cycle is about 10 thousands zlotys (from 5-12 thousands zlotys). 3-5 cycles are usually used for one couple which causes the cost of 30-50 thousands of zlotys. These costs are paid by the centers which use the procedure in vitro. The secondary costs are paid by all medical centers where children of in vitro with their mothers come to. The secondary costs are composed of: the cost of maintaining the multiple pregnancy, the cost of birth from the pregnancy of high risk, the cost of perinatal death rate, the cost of premature birth, the cost of getting various diseases, the cost of using surgeries, the cost of birth defects spreading in different medical centers for many years. We can imagine the amount of the secondary costs, when we know one of the lowest ones. And the cost of medical care of a healthy born baby in hospital is 1000 zlotys, whereas the cost of the analogical medical care of a prematurely born baby is 23 thousands zlotys. In 2012 NFZ (the National Health Service) in Poland will have about 60 mln zl for all departments of medical service. Debts of medical centers, mainly hospitals were over 2 mld zl in the and of the first half a year. In Częstochowa all hospitals are in debts, the biggest specialistic hospital is in debts of about 100 mln zl. No surgeries have been performed since the autumn of this year, because of the lack of money allocated to hospital for 2011 by NFZ. For the same reasons people wait for specialistic medical check-ups for 1, 5 - 2 years. Moreover a vast number of medications will be paid by patients from 1 January 2012. In this situation the lobbying of the 'procreative industry' whose facts people can and are obliged to get to know, still pushes married couples suffering from childlessness and who are often unaware of these facts, into the participation in the inhuman procedure in vitro. In addition, irresponsible people, including doctors, want to force taxpayers to pay for the procedure which is highly unsuccessful and very dangerous but profitable for the members of the 'procreative industry'. It happens so, despite that there is a human alternative for childless married couples - napro-technology, in which the effectiveness of the birth of a baby is estimated for 70-80% and is not burdened with any risk, either for a mother or a baby. Working out this method with proving its effectiveness and possibility of carrying it out has been in the Office of Seym Analysis in Poland since 2009.

Bibliography

1. B. Chazan, "The law or ethics, medicine or veterinary medicine?", In: "In vitro fertilization - opportunity or threat?", Bydgoszcz 2011.
2. Midro AT, "Selected genetic disorders in children resulting from the use of IVF procedures in vitro," in: "Let us care for lives," Bialystok 2011.
3. Rybak, G., The editor of 'Newspaper for Physicians' dr. Richard Golański, Controversy in vitro, Catholic Association of Polish Physicians, www.kslp.pl.
4. Terlikowski TP, "The method of in vitro and discussion of social consciousness," in: "In vitro fertilization - opportunity or threat?", Bydgoszcz 2011.
5. Wasilewski D., "Aspects of efficiency and effectiveness in vitro in the context of health care financing system in Poland", in: "Let us care for lives," Bialystok 2011.
6. T. Wasilewski, "Life and dignity of every human being and treatment of marital infertility. In vitro or napro-technology? ", In: " Let us care for lives, "Białystok 2011.

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Wanda MD Terlecka - a specialist in lung diseases and railway medicine, a founder and chief surgeon for many years (until 2008) of the Department of Lung Diseases of the Regional Hospital in Częstochowa, a co-founder of the Polish Code of Medical Ethics and the first president of the Regional Medical Chamber in Łódź. Since 2010 - President of the Catholic Association of Polish Physicians, which was founded in 1994 at Jasna Góra during the Second World Day of the Sick, in the presence of Cardinal Fiorenzo Angelini - Chairman of the Pontifical Council for Health Pastoral Care. Catholic Association of Polish Physicians includes Christian-minded physicians. Doctors belonging to the Association consistently defend human life from the conception until natural death.

(AA)

"Niedziela" 49/2011

Editor: Tygodnik Katolicki "Niedziela", ul. 3 Maja 12, 42-200 Czestochowa, Polska
Editor-in-chief: Fr Jaroslaw Grabowski • E-mail: redakcja@niedziela.pl