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semiotic_pirateNote/Warning: Severe rant induced by following article to come. Call me on my mistakes and if you opinion differs, I encourage debate.
Yeah, this sums it up nicely... Why are people so aggressive about needing/wanting their "own" kids when there are plenty out there who need to be adopted? If you have difficult conceiving due to age or infirmity of your genetic content it would be safer and better to adopt anyways. I know of plenty of people who, realizing their genetic carrier status of a specific disease will purposely deny themselves child-bearing but they don't deny themselves child rearing. Adoption. Why is it still viewed as some hideous option for well to do people? Why do people continue to look at these children as someone elses leftovers/byblows and as unworthy-of-my-family-name?? What type of incentive program could be devised in order to market these children as viable alternatives to the extreme expense of IVF and all the other hoo-ha?
Is it because you have to qualify as a good potential parent or family unit to adopt but you don't just to get pregnant? (This getting pregnant is for both the women and the men in a couple or singleton situation, m-kay?) What about foster home caregivers? Are people not willing to do this because then they won't "own" the kid outright? Is it because people expect to be some juvenile delinquent that will ruin their comfy little existences? What? You can "start a family" without getting physically pregnant using your own genetic material.
----->In some small way I understand those religions that deny medical treatment and the over-the-top lifesaving or lifegiving techniques of modern technological medicine. We cannot get around the fact that natural selection exists for a reason. I also think this is why so many folks are tenaciously against abortion of any kind because if the fetus is viable then it is healthy enough to be born and should because it would contribute GENETIC variation and so forth. (Not counting rape, incest, or where the mother's life would be endangered by said pregnancy.) Look at what is going on with the Battlestar Galactica crew - no abortions allowed and pro-baby policies because of a desperate need to continue the human species' existence. Of course, we are in no danger of extinction, look at how the population grows continuously on our little fragile planet.
Here's another reason to consider foster-care and adoption. Oh, and BTW, adopt kids from your neighborhood or at least your own country first because we cannot help others until we help OURSELVES. And that isn't selfishness on my part, just common sense.
And, realize that this sentence: "But the experts stressed the overall risk was still relatively low." is referring to the risk added to possible defects and such only as caused by IVF and fertility treatment itself. The treatments themselves don't add much risk to the already RISKY situation of why the couple or person is infertile in the first place.
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Infertility link to autism risk
Couples with fertility problems are three times more likely to have a child with serious conditions like autism and cerebral palsy, research suggests.
The extra risk is likely to be caused by health problems that make it difficult for these couples to conceive in the first place, scientists believe.
Fertility treatments, such as IVF, may contribute too, an American Society for Reproductive Medicine meeting heard.
But the experts stressed the overall risk was still relatively low.
They said couples should be counselled about the risks and encouraged to improve their health before undergoing fertility treatment.
Professor Mary Croughan, who led the University of California research on 4,000 women and their children aged up to six years, explained those with fertility problems were also more likely to have other health problems, such as heart disease and diabetes, and were more at risk of pregnancy and labour complications.
She said: "What has caused them to be unable to conceive goes on to cause problems.
"It is as if a brick wall has stopped you becoming pregnant. Treatment allows you to climb over the wall, but it is still there and it goes on to cause problems."
Raised risk
Her team found the risk of five conditions - autism, mental retardation, cerebral palsy, seizures and cancer - was 2.7 times higher among the children born to 2,000 women who experienced fertility problems than among those born to the 2,000 women who did not have difficult conceiving.
For autism alone, the risk was four times higher.
Moderate developmental problems such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, learning disabilities or serious sight or hearing disorders were also 40% more common in the children born to the couples who struggled to start a family.
Stuart Lavery, a spokesman for the British Fertility Society, questioned how valid the findings were because of the wide range of fertility problems and treatments the women had.
"There is no doubt that people who have difficulties with their fertility have difficulties conceiving and carrying pregnancies, although it has not been shown that it is the infertility that is causing the problems," he added.
Clare Brown of Infertility Network UK said continued work was needed to ensure treatment was safe for couples and potential children.
At the same conference, doctors heard how Britain should consider paying women thousands of pounds to donate their eggs.
US clinics often pay women up to $10,000 (£5,200) per IVF cycle. In comparison, British clinics can offer £250 plus travel and childcare expenses.
A spokesman for The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority said it had no plans to review the £250 cap, set last year.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/6086824.stm
Yeah, this sums it up nicely... Why are people so aggressive about needing/wanting their "own" kids when there are plenty out there who need to be adopted? If you have difficult conceiving due to age or infirmity of your genetic content it would be safer and better to adopt anyways. I know of plenty of people who, realizing their genetic carrier status of a specific disease will purposely deny themselves child-bearing but they don't deny themselves child rearing. Adoption. Why is it still viewed as some hideous option for well to do people? Why do people continue to look at these children as someone elses leftovers/byblows and as unworthy-of-my-family-name?? What type of incentive program could be devised in order to market these children as viable alternatives to the extreme expense of IVF and all the other hoo-ha?
Is it because you have to qualify as a good potential parent or family unit to adopt but you don't just to get pregnant? (This getting pregnant is for both the women and the men in a couple or singleton situation, m-kay?) What about foster home caregivers? Are people not willing to do this because then they won't "own" the kid outright? Is it because people expect to be some juvenile delinquent that will ruin their comfy little existences? What? You can "start a family" without getting physically pregnant using your own genetic material.
----->In some small way I understand those religions that deny medical treatment and the over-the-top lifesaving or lifegiving techniques of modern technological medicine. We cannot get around the fact that natural selection exists for a reason. I also think this is why so many folks are tenaciously against abortion of any kind because if the fetus is viable then it is healthy enough to be born and should because it would contribute GENETIC variation and so forth. (Not counting rape, incest, or where the mother's life would be endangered by said pregnancy.) Look at what is going on with the Battlestar Galactica crew - no abortions allowed and pro-baby policies because of a desperate need to continue the human species' existence. Of course, we are in no danger of extinction, look at how the population grows continuously on our little fragile planet.
Here's another reason to consider foster-care and adoption. Oh, and BTW, adopt kids from your neighborhood or at least your own country first because we cannot help others until we help OURSELVES. And that isn't selfishness on my part, just common sense.
And, realize that this sentence: "But the experts stressed the overall risk was still relatively low." is referring to the risk added to possible defects and such only as caused by IVF and fertility treatment itself. The treatments themselves don't add much risk to the already RISKY situation of why the couple or person is infertile in the first place.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Infertility link to autism risk
Couples with fertility problems are three times more likely to have a child with serious conditions like autism and cerebral palsy, research suggests.
The extra risk is likely to be caused by health problems that make it difficult for these couples to conceive in the first place, scientists believe.
Fertility treatments, such as IVF, may contribute too, an American Society for Reproductive Medicine meeting heard.
But the experts stressed the overall risk was still relatively low.
They said couples should be counselled about the risks and encouraged to improve their health before undergoing fertility treatment.
Professor Mary Croughan, who led the University of California research on 4,000 women and their children aged up to six years, explained those with fertility problems were also more likely to have other health problems, such as heart disease and diabetes, and were more at risk of pregnancy and labour complications.
She said: "What has caused them to be unable to conceive goes on to cause problems.
"It is as if a brick wall has stopped you becoming pregnant. Treatment allows you to climb over the wall, but it is still there and it goes on to cause problems."
Raised risk
Her team found the risk of five conditions - autism, mental retardation, cerebral palsy, seizures and cancer - was 2.7 times higher among the children born to 2,000 women who experienced fertility problems than among those born to the 2,000 women who did not have difficult conceiving.
For autism alone, the risk was four times higher.
Moderate developmental problems such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, learning disabilities or serious sight or hearing disorders were also 40% more common in the children born to the couples who struggled to start a family.
Stuart Lavery, a spokesman for the British Fertility Society, questioned how valid the findings were because of the wide range of fertility problems and treatments the women had.
"There is no doubt that people who have difficulties with their fertility have difficulties conceiving and carrying pregnancies, although it has not been shown that it is the infertility that is causing the problems," he added.
Clare Brown of Infertility Network UK said continued work was needed to ensure treatment was safe for couples and potential children.
At the same conference, doctors heard how Britain should consider paying women thousands of pounds to donate their eggs.
US clinics often pay women up to $10,000 (£5,200) per IVF cycle. In comparison, British clinics can offer £250 plus travel and childcare expenses.
A spokesman for The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority said it had no plans to review the £250 cap, set last year.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/6086824.stm
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no subject
Date: 2006-10-27 09:33 pm (UTC)One practical reason for many people to seek international adoption is that the U.S. gives a lot of benefit of doubt to the child's biological parents (a little too much in my opinion). The biological mom can pretty much decide at any point that she wants her kid back, and chances are that she'll get him/her (even if the kid would rather stay with the adoptive family).
Another reason many prospective adoptive parents go abroad start in the practical realm and ends in vanity. Domestic adoption policies create almost unsurmountable hurtles, and domestic adoption is extremely expensive--especially if you "must" have a white baby. Most people with the means to adopt are white, and they refuse to even look at infants that don't look like them or at older children. It's a lot easier and cheaper to go to Russia or Romania.
Actually, Poland is about the cheapest country that allows international adoption. Unless things change domestically, if I ever got the baby rabies (which I doubt), I'd probably go to Poland to get a kid. (I'm from Poland.)
Two of my (white) professors from Clark (married to each other) adopted two black kids. I find that cool because one of them teaches evolution, so she's realy leading by example. (I'm referring to the whole "there's more genetic variation within races than among them, but we're all over 99.9% identical anyway" thing.)
no subject
Date: 2006-10-27 11:23 pm (UTC)from what I hear (and I cannot quote the stats) the type of situation you are talking about are for children that are taken away from their parents, (like those that have addiction problems and complications arising from POVERTY conditions) not those that are given up voluntarily. kind of like the new laws that allow teen mothers to just drop off their kid when born at a local hospital without recriminations. this is why young and or new mothers shouldn't be pressured to sign the documents just after birth. it won't harm the child any (if they are supervised if there is a question of that) for the mother to care for the infant for a time at the hospital.
this is why access to birth parent information and placement information should be inviolate and kept from each side and allowed to be breached after the child reaches a certain age BY THE CHILD if they even want to find out who their birth parents are.
reminds me of orphan annie, really, I was one of the people who (as a child) got to see the movie when it was first released back in the late 70's early 80's.
no subject
Date: 2006-10-28 01:26 am (UTC)Adoption, you have to make friends over time, and might or might not. Biological, you start out loving em, right?
I agree about local adoptions, but on a more practical level- adopt a kid who speaks your language and customs. It'll help them.
All of my ideas on this topic are about what makes for the happiest, healthiest kids. That's why I favor birth control and abortion real strongly over adoption- don't force that child into an unhappy situation!
I'll agree to disagree, though I'll try to sway you with this...
Date: 2006-10-28 01:41 am (UTC)Actually no, you don't. In the biological way you have the entire pregnancy (10 months total) to make an imaginary relationship up with your fetus. You bond with it, only in your mind, making plans and whatever. You can do the same in an adoption process, however behavioral expression, who that individual is inherently right? The core of the person may not always turn out to be what you want or expect. The decision is whether or not you will extend unconditional love to another individual in a parental mode.
How many people do you know, biological children of their parents, where the son/daughter is unable to communicate or get along with the mother/father? Shakespeare wrote about it for gawds sake, it has been the fodder of writers and playwrights for centuries. At least in adoption you can choose the individual instead of playing russian roulette on the personality compatibility scale. We, as individuals, create our own communities through friendships and so forth... And the family unit as it exists now is a societal creation.
there are examples EVERYWHERE with a lot of species that are similar to us of adoption, a choice to care for another being (usually a youngling) as if it is their own.
no subject
Date: 2006-10-28 02:44 pm (UTC)Yet human psychology is fairly fluid. Some of us (not me) are capable of learling how to solve partial differential equations, even though our natural environment never favored people who wasted too much time on abstractions. Again, having your own kids is better for the alleles you carry than adoption would be (evolutionarily, it makes little sense for a bereft mother to steal a random baby to replace the one she lost, and yet it happens), but human thought processes aren't set in stone.
no subject
Date: 2006-10-28 01:54 am (UTC)And they are ecstatic new daddies. :)
no subject
Date: 2006-10-28 02:08 am (UTC)The biggest hassle I have faced is the unknown medical history.
And yes, the adoption process is quite long and so there is a relationship that develops during that time as well.
Contact me in email if you want more personal specifics or pointers to VERY good resources.