Thinking about the ethical, legal and political relationships between IVF and abortion (in JAMA)

Some people support both IVF and abortion (women's right to choose) and some people oppose both (embryos are people), but many oppose abortion but support IVF.  Here's an article that focuses on some ethical distinctions (is the intention to have a child or not), and also on some political ones (IVF patients are on average more affluent than abortion patients).

Watson K. Rethinking the Ethical and Legal Relationship Between IVF and Abortion. JAMA. Published online May 22, 2025. doi:10.1001/jama.2025.6733 

"US voters have elected a president who promised he would make the government or private insurance cover in vitro fertilization (IVF), yet takes credit for reversing Roe v Wade. These positions highlight a question that has lingered since US IVF practice began in 1981: are hospital and governmental policies that support IVF but do not support abortion ethically consistent? And if not, why is this division so common?

"Those who see IVF and abortion as ethically distinct often focus on differences in intention and outcome—having a baby vs avoiding having a baby. Others see them as comparable practices because both destroy embryos. I offer a third perspective, which is that abortion and IVF are comparable practices because both are family-building medical interventions; therefore, support for IVF access ought to lead to support for abortion access.

"Abortion was a federal constitutional right until 2022, and IVF was subject to state regulation like the rest of medicine. Yet constitutional protection did not stop many states from heavily regulating abortion, and IVF rarely faced governmental limits. A stark example of their disparate treatment occurred shortly after Roe v Wade was reversed when the traditionally antiabortion state of Indiana began its statute criminalizing abortion provision by clarifying “This article does not apply to in vitro fertilization” (IN Code §16-34-1-0.5 [2024]).

"Yet like abortion, IVF also involves embryo death. 

...

" differences in patient income, race, age, and education also suggest a stark difference in political power between the constituencies invested in IVF and abortion. Eighty-one percent of fertility patients have household incomes of more than $100 000 and 75% are White6; 72% of abortion patients have incomes less than 200% of the federal poverty line and 59% are Black or Latinx.3 Sixty-four percent of IVF patients are 35 years or older,7 while 70% of abortion patients are in their teens or 20s.3 Fourteen percent of births to women with a college or graduate degree were conceived with the use of assisted reproductive technology, but only 1.5% of births to women with some college or less were conceived with assisted reproductive technology in 2023.8 In contrast, 77% of abortion patients have some college or less.9 (There are no data documenting how many IVF patients deferred their childbearing by having an abortion when they were younger, or how many IVF patients later abort to decrease a multiple pregnancy or avoid unexpected medical problems.)

"Entities involved in providing IVF also have financial interests in preserving the legality of a practice with a median cost of $19 200 per cycle.6 Infertility care generates approximately $8 billion per year in gross revenues in the US.10 High operating margins have drawn private equity investors to many private fertility practices, and IVF is lucrative for hospitals and physicians."