What is it?
Terminology and meaning regarding fetal experimentation
Human Embryo Research
Human embryo research is defined as research involving ex utero (outside the womb) pre-implantation human embryos who have never been implanted in the womb of their mother. Also included would be those human embryos who have been "flushed" from the wombs of their mother prior to implantation. An ex utero pre-implantation human embryo is described as that which is fertilised. Fetal Experimentation can be carried out on the living human fetus while he or she still lives in the womb.
Experimentation can also be carried out on the living human baby after delivery. If the experiment is done with the intention of later killing this living human to determine the effects from the experiment, then a serious crime is committed against human rights. Fetal experimentation, as in the abortion industry, is a very lucrative one. Now the abortionist can charge a fee for the actual abortion and then use the child's body body for further earnings. We are in the dangerous situation of dealing with people who will surpass all forms of indecency for material gain. Although they seem to lack any form of humanity or feeling they are plagued with pangs of guilt and so they begin to explain their role in life as seeking cures for the diseases of the world.
Rather than it being immoral to do what we are trying to do, it is immoral - it is a terrible perversion of ethics - to throw these fetuses in the incinerator as is usually done rather than to get some useful information.
Dr. Jerald Gaull, Chief Paediatric Research at New York State Institute for Basic Research in Mental Retardation
After the child is born, he or she no longer needs their placenta. For many years, hospitals in other countries have frozen and sold them to drug companies to extract hormones and other substances. More recently, placentas have also been sold to cosmetic manufacturing companies. This may be distasteful or even revolting to many people. There is, however, no major ethical problem in such use.
Fetus Ex Utero
This is a live-born baby. Such terminology is mere semantic gymnastics to hide the humanity of the newborn baby and to make it more likely that the public will allow experimentation and killing. It is also a contradiction in terms, as the technical biological name of the being still in the uterus is "fetus," but the proper biologic name, once outside the uterus, is baby or infant.It has been said that we need some human experimentation? We can't learn everything from other research.On the contrary!
With proper design and effort and money, animal experiments can solve almost every fetal problem presently under investigation. A man did not have to be shot into space naked to learn the hazards of unsupported life in the stratosphere.
Eunice Kennedy Shriver, Nat'l Inst. Child Health and Development, Washington Post, April 21, 1973.
Newborn Anencephalic Babies
Some people say that it is okay to use newborn anencephalic babies as organ donors. But, these are live babies and they should not be killed for their organs. Loma Linda University experimented with such babies but quit when it became evident that by the time of brain death, (including brain stem death) the other organs were not usable.
Fetal Organs
Transplantation of foetal organs into the body of a born person should observe the same ethical norms as for organs from born persons. These include:
Proper permission, i.e., from parents who have loved and offered proper care to keep the unborn baby alive and well. If the parent is part of the killing team, she surrenders any moral right to give such permission.
The newly developed baby must be dead (there are definition of death laws in most countries) before any organs are removed. One cannot kill a baby (in or out of the uterus) to get an organ.