Frozen embryos are children, according to Alabama Supreme Court

February 21, 2024

Alabama Supreme Court Justices arrive during the State of the State address at the Alabama State Capitol in Montgomery, Ala., on Tuesday, Feb. 6, 2024.

USA TODAY NETWORK

Alabama’s Supreme Court ruled Friday that frozen embryos should be considered children. The case involved a 2020 incident in an Alabama hospital when a patient removed frozen embryos and dropped them on the floor.

The ruling complicates the legality of in vitro fertilization and could dissuade fertility doctors from practicing in the state out of fear of being brought up on criminal charges.

One in six families experiences infertility, and if they choose in vitro fertilization, it is standard practice to extract as many eggs as possible from a woman, and then fertilize them to create embryos before freezing them. The ruling gives these cells the same legal protections as a fetus in the womb or a newborn child.

The Biden administration is condemning the ruling and using it to amplify calls for Congress to codify abortion protections into law.

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LUDOVIC MARIN/Pool via REUTERS

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Al Drago/Pool/Sipa USA

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South Sudan's Vice President Riek Machar, pictured here addressing the press in 2020.

REUTERS/Samir Bol

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Afghan Interior Minister Sirajuddin Haqqani, pictured here at the anniversary event of the departure of the Soviet Union from Afghanistan, in Kabul, Afghanistan, on April 28, 2022.

REUTERS/Ali Khara

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Frozen embryos are children, according to Alabama Supreme Court

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Subscribe to GZERO Media's newsletter: Signal

An internal GOP poll found a Republican candidate trailing in a special election for a conservative-leaning district in Florida, forcing US President Donald Trump to make a decision aimed at maintaining the Republican Party’s majority in the House.

The Trump administration has dropped multimillion-dollar bounties on senior Afghan officials from the Haqqani network, a militant faction that carried out some of the deadliest attacks on American troops but has now positioned itself as a moderate wing within the Taliban government. But why?

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Canada’s foreign interference watchdog is warning that China, India, and Russia plan on meddling in the country’s federal election. The contest, which launched last weekend, has already been marked by a handful of stories about past covert foreign interventions and threats of new ones.