November 15, 2022

Research Shows 80% of IVF Embryos are Rejected or Killed

New research published in Reproductive Biomedicine Online shows that 80% of the 2.5 million embryos created each year for IVF either die during the process, are frozen indefinitely, or are destroyed.

While it's not necessarily a true comparison (a pregnancy that is started with IVF can end in abortion), the World Health Organization writes that only 29% of all pregnancies end in abortion. The percentage of IVF embryos with negative outcomes is significantly higher than the percentage of pregnancies that end in abortion.

Fertility clinics often offer gender selection and allow parents to test their embryos to "weed out" children with undesirable traits. Many other embryos are abandoned or killed simply because they are "extra." Estimates say that there are about 1 million frozen embryos in the United States alone, many of which have been abandoned.