The Human Egg Business: More Media Coverage of California Cash-for-Eggs Legislation

Untitled Document A renewed legislative effort in California to pay women for handing over their eggs for research is attracting more attention this year, including opposition from a former state senator sometimes called the mother of the state's stem cell agency.

Deborah Ortiz, former chair of the California Senate Health Committee, wrote an op-ed piece published this week in The Sacramento Bee. She noted that the stem cell agency prohibits paying women for their eggs. Ortiz wrote,

"I oppose AB 2531 (the number of the bill) on a number of grounds: First, we have very limited information on the long-term health effects of the egg retrieval process. Second, women who undergo egg retrieval are not research subjects in the traditional sense, as proponents assert. Finally, paying for women’s eggs for research purposes contradicts well-established national recommendations and state policy."

She continued,

"This is not an issue of equity with other research subjects. Women providing eggs for research are not comparable to research subjects in clinical trials. Their role is providing raw materials for pre-clinical research, rather than...