{"title":"A cold yield. Cryopreserved oocytes of “social freezing” customers as potential option values for biomedical research","authors":"Alexander Friedrich","doi":"10.1080/14636778.2020.1755637","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"While the demand for “social freezing” services has increased significantly in recent years, the number of cryopreserved eggs that are actually being used in treatment remains very low, so far. Both tendencies indicate a continuously growing stock of unused oocytes. In this article, I discuss the possibility that the growing stock could be co-opted to solve the problem of egg procurement especially for biomedical research. As a consequence, the secondary utilization of female fertility resources would become their main form of use. However, this would finally turn the customers of fertility services into unintended productive forces of a cryotechnologically advanced bioeconomy. The paper discusses the risk of a subtle form of exploitation that could be associated with this reproductive service in the future, which will pose further challenges for the practice of informed consent.","PeriodicalId":54724,"journal":{"name":"New Genetics and Society","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3000,"publicationDate":"2020-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"12","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"New Genetics and Society","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14636778.2020.1755637","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q4","JCRName":"BIOTECHNOLOGY & APPLIED MICROBIOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 12
Abstract
While the demand for “social freezing” services has increased significantly in recent years, the number of cryopreserved eggs that are actually being used in treatment remains very low, so far. Both tendencies indicate a continuously growing stock of unused oocytes. In this article, I discuss the possibility that the growing stock could be co-opted to solve the problem of egg procurement especially for biomedical research. As a consequence, the secondary utilization of female fertility resources would become their main form of use. However, this would finally turn the customers of fertility services into unintended productive forces of a cryotechnologically advanced bioeconomy. The paper discusses the risk of a subtle form of exploitation that could be associated with this reproductive service in the future, which will pose further challenges for the practice of informed consent.
期刊介绍:
New Genetics and Society: Critical Studies of Contemporary Biosciences is a world-leading journal which:
-Provides a focus for interdisciplinary and multi-disciplinary, leading-edge social science research on the new genetics and related biosciences;
-Publishes theoretical and empirical contributions reflecting its multi-faceted development;
-Provides an international platform for critical reflection and debate;
-Is an invaluable research resource for the many related professions, including health, medicine and the law, wishing to keep abreast of fast changing developments in contemporary biosciences.
New Genetics and Society publishes papers on the social aspects of the new genetics (widely defined), including gene editing, genomics, proteomics, epigenetics and systems biology; and the rapidly developing biosciences such as biomedical and reproductive therapies and technologies, xenotransplantation, stem cell research and neuroscience. Our focus is on developing a better understanding of the social, legal, ethical and policy aspects, including their local and global management and organisation.