Ethical Dilemmas in Posthumous Assisted Reproduction | Biomedgrid

Introduction: Posthumous assisted reproduction is a method that is being used by more and more people to acquire children. Men donate their genetic material while in life or just before they die, so they can continue their genealogy. Purpose: The purpose of this review is to present ethical dilemmas in posthumous artificial fertilization. Methodology: The material of the study has been recent articles on the subject. They have been mainly found through the electronic database Medline and the Hellenic Academic Libraries Link (HEAL-Link), with the following keywords: ethical dilemmas, artificial fertilization, and posthumous assisted reproduction. Results: Posthumous assisted reproduction now appears as a given reality. Many reservations have been raised regarding the permissibility of posthumous artificial fertilization. The most important thing is that the child born after posthumous artificial fertilization will not have a father. The institution of posthumous assisted reproduction is appropriate only for couples, married or unmarried, and not for single solitary women. The child to be born will be considered as a child born into a marriage while the partner's spouse's paternity whose consent to heterologous fertilization had been given, will not be affected. Conclusions: The need for a single legal framework to be applied by all countries is necessary, since to date, each state has established its own laws and rules to deal with issues arising from assisted reproduction.