The darker side of infertility
By Pat Duggins,
Alabama Public Radio
| 06. 27. 2025
PAT DUGGINS-- If I were to say, ‘man, have you seen the price of eggs these days?’ You're probably thinking, Oh, he's talking about inflation and the price of groceries and how it became an issue in the presidential race and how nothing has changed, and so on and so on. That's not what I mean. I'm not talking about the kinds of eggs that build omelets. I mean the kinds of eggs that build families. The Alabama Supreme Court created a political shock wave last year when it declared that frozen human embryos were children. The legal case involved people looking to start families through in vitro fertilization. These couples allege that their eggs were destroyed. Some moms and dads to be like these, use their own fertilized eggs. Others have reproductive issues that require donated eggs, and there's a whole industry in the US to supply them. It's a story of money, racism and a process that can reportedly harm both female egg donors and the children that result. Diane Tober is in the middle of this issue...
Related Articles
By Dr. Coco Newton, Progress Educational Trust | 03.30.2026
Have you ever wondered what it means to have dozens of half-siblings across the world – or to never know where half of your genetic identity comes from? A recent episode of Zembla explores the human consequences of the global...
By Rob Stein, NPR | 04.23.2026
The Food and Drug Administration approved the first gene therapy to restore hearing for people who were born deaf.
The decision, while only immediately affecting people born with a very rare form of genetic deafness, is being hailed as...
By Emily Mullin, Wired | 04.23.2026
A STARTUP OUT of Utah, Paterna Biosciences, says it has successfully grown functional human sperm in a lab and used the sperm to make visibly healthy-looking embryos. The technique could eventually help men with certain types of infertility have biological children...
By Julianna LeMieux, Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News | 04.14.2026
Twenty years ago, Sven Bocklandt, PhD, sought to create a hypoallergenic cat. He had the genetic engineering chops to do it, but the embryology was beyond his capabilities. At a small animal genetic engineering conference, known as TARC (Transgenic Animal...