Assisted reproductive technology The case of Evans vs. Howard Natalie Evans was 30 when she had to have her ovaries removed as part of a successful treatment for cancer. In November 2001, before her cancer treatment, she and Howard undertook in vitro fertilization (IVF), producing embryos that were frozen so that they could attempt to have a family at a later stage. Unfortunately, the couple split up. Natalie's only hope of having a child that was genetically hers was to have the frozen embryos transferred to her womb to try to become pregnant. Howard however refused to give his consent to this procedure, as was his right under the UK Human Fertilization and Embryology (HFE) Act (1990). Natalie embarked upon a series of appeals against the judgement that she should not be allowed to use the embryos in an attempt to have a child. In April 2007, the European Court of Human Rights finally ruled against her, and her fight to save the embryos was lost. The significance of this is that the principle of shared responsibility for the future of stored embryos takes precedence over one partner's desire to try to create a pregnancy with a child that is genetically their own.

The ethical issues here arise from the fact that the two parents have an equal say in the fate of embryos created by artificial reproductive technologies. This chapter will analyze and discuss aspects of the complex arguments behind this apparently unproblematic statement. Before embarking on our discussion, we need to say that there is considerable overlap between this chapter and the next. This is deliberate because we wanted readers to be able to use them as 'standalone' articles if they so wished.

Question: 1. Clearly identify the ethical question. Explain why it is an ethical question. 2. Identify who or what could be affected by the way the question gets resolved.