Public comment of The National Catholic Bioethics Center et al. on Proposal to clarify requirements for pronouncement of death by the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network
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On December 23, 2022, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) changed its Drug Facts Label for Plan B One-Step (PBOS), removing language that, since 2006, had stated that PBOS “may inhibit implantation (by altering the endometrium).” The FDA’s action has created the impression that PBOS and similar, generic levonorgestrel-based drugs used for “emergency contraception” (LNG-EC) have no effect on the survival of a human being conceived following sexual assault.
Unfortunately, the FDA did not address all factors relevant to how LNG-EC can impact human life after fertilization. Specifically, the FDA did not fully address a well-known concern that LNG-EC can prevent pregnancy even after it fails to prevent ovulation. Since this important issue was not resolved and concerns about LNG-EC’s post-fertilization effects remain, the National Catholic Bioethics Center will maintain its longstanding position that Catholic health care institutions and professionals should ensure with moral certitude (that is, by excluding any reasonable doubts), at a minimum, that LNG-EC is not dispensed when it could not prevent ovulation but may well cause the death of an embryo. Catholics should resist legislation that requires dispensing of LNG-EC on the basis of a negative pregnancy test alone.
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The National Catholic Bioethics Center (NCBC) welcomes the momentous Dobbs decision, which reverses decades of injustice that began with Roe v. Wade. This tragic injustice took the lives of millions of innocent children and, in addition, deeply harmed many women, who too often were not supported when facing an unplanned pregnancy. The Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs not only has rectified the Roe regime’s national denial of 14thAmendment protections to unborn human beings, it also restores to the states their right to legislate on matters of due process, life, and liberty as these pertain to unborn children. Respect for the will of the people in individual states is the foundation of our Republic.
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When one peruses the secular literature on bioethics, one often comes across various “arguments” defending embryonic destructive research. The arguments coming up most often are (a) the twinning argument, (b) the dicephalic twin case (c) the brain transplant example, and (d) the embryo rescue case. We find none of these arguments persuasive.
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