What does it mean to be infertile? Infertility is when a couple have been having unprotected sex for a period of 1 year without achieving pregnancy. Male infertility- where the male is not producing enough sperm to achieve pregnancy. (Sperm count) Female infertility- Not enough eggs being produced or eggs released at the wrong time Fallopian tubes blocked Cervix acts as a barrier to conception Eggs do not mature properly, Fibroids (small tumors growing out of muscle tissue that affect reproductive organs from functioning correctly.

Using the work sheet...Match the term with the definition AIH Surrogacy Egg donation IVF AID Embryo donation (Test-tube babies) Egg and sperm are fertilised in a laboratory Artificial insemination using husbands sperm A woman donates her eggs to another woman A woman carries a baby for another woman A woman donates an embryo to another woman Artificial Insemination using a donor’s sperm

IVF gender screened hereditary embryos healthiest parents Genetic Screening Genetic screening is where several _______ are produced through ____ and then ‘_________’ to find the _________ or most suitable one for the ________. It can be used to decide the _______ of the baby and to rule out potential ____________ genetic problems. IVF gender screened hereditary embryos healthiest parents

Saviour Siblings Saviour siblings are sometimes called ‘spare parts’ babies. They are created so that tissue or bone marrow can be taken from them to help save the life of a brother or sister (sibling) suffering from diseases such as leukaemia or thalassaemia. They are created from embryos which have been ‘screened’ to find ones which have tissue that matches their suffering sibling. When the baby is born stem cells from the umbilical cord are taken to treat the sibling. Sometimes bone marrow is taken to treat the sibling. This can be uncomfortable for the child and may have to be repeated. Campaigners fear that saviour siblings would be seen as ‘commodities’ – only useful for spare body parts.

What is fertility treatment? This slide provides students with a brief description of fertility treatment. Students could initially be asked if they can explain any of the terms in circles, before matching each description to a term.

What do religious people think about fertility treatment? This is a cloze sentence exercise. Not all words are used in the text. The completed text is provided below. You may wish to copy and paste this into a text document, and print copies for students to keep for reference. Alternatively you could delete words and students could complete the gap fill activity individually. Christians, Jews and Muslims believe that children are a gift from God and sympathize with those who can’t have any. Christians and Muslims will agree with fertility treatment if it doesn’t involve a third party, so AIH would be allowed but AID would not; egg or embryo donation would not be allowed because that would break the sanctity of marriage. When IVF treatment is used spare embryos are created. Sometimes these are experimented on to try to cure infertility or genetic diseases, at other times they are destroyed. Catholics don’t agree with this because they believe that life begins at conception so it is breaking the commandment ‘thou shalt not kill’. Christians and Jews think that surrogate motherhood is wrong because it violates the marriage. Muslims say that surrogacy is only acceptable is the man is married to both the woman who gives the egg and the surrogate mother (Muslims are allowed to have more than one wife). Jews will allow egg donation; many prefer that the egg should come from another Jewess so that the faith is carried on, but others say that this can be done through upbringing. Jews will allow AIH but not AID as it would be seen as a form of adultery, while IVF would be acceptable if the egg and sperm are not donated but come from the husband and wife.