WASHINGTON — Sen. Tammy Duckworth made history in 2018 when she became the first senator to give birth while in office. She underwent in vitro fertilization, a procedure used to assist women in getting pregnant by fertilizing an egg in a laboratory setting and implanting it in the uterus.
Now the Illinois Democrat, doctors and advocates are worried about how the Supreme Court potentially overturning a 50-year-old precedent establishing abortion rights could impact IVF, which has helped millions of people struggling with fertility issues conceive.
More than a dozen states have “trigger” laws on the books that would ban abortion if the court overturns Roe v. Wade, and some are written to state that life begins at conception or fertilization. That raises questions about what would happen with IVF, which can result in excess embryos that people sometimes discard, freeze for future use or donate to science or other people.
