Amendments to the Embryo Protection Act due to PGD passed in Parliament

According to Professor Dr. Monika Frommel, Director of the Institute for Sanctions Law and Criminology at Kiel University, who secured the favorable ruling for the reproductive medicine specialist (AGCT-Gentechnik-report7-8/2010), all of the proposed legislation represent a step backward from the possibilities opened up by the Federal Court of Justice. She emphasized this again during a presentation by the Working Group for Female Lawyers on June 7, 2011, in Münster. In her view, none of the drafts discussed in Parliament represent any real progress for the affected women, who, in her opinion, are entitled to PGD even under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). This constitutes a total ban on the right to reproductive freedom and thus violates Article 8 of the ECHR, since prenatal diagnostics (PND), i.e., medical examinations during pregnancy that can detect possible damage or illness in the unborn child, are permissible. If the severity of the disease is determined, abortion is permissible even at a very late stage of the pregnancy.
Parliament has not yet adopted this broader view. It has opted for limited approval of PGD. In the future, couples will be able to use the method if, due to their genetic predisposition, a serious hereditary disease in the child or a stillcarriage or miscarriage is likely. The limited approval of genetic testing on artificially created embryos is intended to give couples who are predisposed to a serious disease the chance of having a healthy child. PGD should be prohibited in principle but permitted in exceptional cases. Prior consultation is mandatory, and an ethics committee must approve it. If the idea is successful, it may only be performed in licensed centers.
As a result, neither the proponents of a strict legal ban nor a compromise draft, which, however, did not contain such stringent exceptions, were able to prevail in Parliament.

This publication can also be found on the website of the law firm Dr. Kauch .