Abstract

The use of electively aborted human fetal tissue in transplantation has raised exciting clinical possibilities, and difficult ethical, social and policy issues. Central to the debate has been whether the use of aborted fetal tissues can be separated from the act of abortion, or if the use is necessarily complicit with abortion. Policy intended to address this issue attempts to separate the two by procedural mechanisms, including the recent recommendations of the Royal Commission on New Reproductive Technologies in Canada. This thesis examines the biological basis for FTT, the philosphical and policy discourse, and provides empirical research to inform the debate. In the first stage of the research, a survey of Ontario physician attitudes toward FTT indicated that the technology may raise ethical issues around the care and status of women seeking abortion services. This gave rise to a second set of investigations: ethnographic interviews with both physicians and non-medical abortion counselors. This research revealed important novel issues, including the threat of conventional FTT policies to women's autonomy and moral agency. These issues are explored in the context of feminist approaches to ethics, and suggest that the debate over FTT needs to be relocated in relation to women's health and concerns. This poses a formidable challenge, both for bioethical scholarship, and in the formulation of relevant, ethical and appropriate public policy