Fetal Tissue Research & Abortion: Conscription, Commodification, and the Future of Choice

Abstract

The use of fetal tissue in medical research has emerged from obscurity to the center of the abortion debate. So far, the political positions taken on either side of the fetal tissue research debate have mirrored those of the pro-choice/pro-life camps, with self-described feminists largely coming out in support of the use of aborted fetuses in medical research. This Article reopens the question of whether fetal tissue research is actually good for women. Surely the right to abortion, and women who exercise it, are necessary for the continuation of fetal tissue research. But is the benefit mutual? Do the practitioners and beneficiaries of fetal tissue research give anything back to the women who supply their raw materials and support those women’s right to access safe abortion services? Or is the relationship between fetal tissue research and abortion somehow exploitive of women’s reproduction? While aborting women are barred from receiving any form of remuneration for fetal tissue donations, that does not apply to the upstream medical companies that process the tissue into usable clinical and pharmaceutical products.

In this Article, I will discuss data on the demographic characteristics of women who have abortions and on the industrial process by which the aborted fetus becomes a commodity. Ultimately, I conclude that cutting women out of the industrial proceeds of fetal tissue research constitutes exploitation of their sexual and reproductive capacities — and disproportionately so for poor women and women of color. To make meaning of this conclusion, I argue that the policy discussion around the relationship between fetal tissue research and abortion should be re-framed in terms of reproductive justice. I will examine feminist and critical race jurisprudential and bioethical theories to develop a critique of the fetal tissue economy, and imagine what policy interventions, if any, might mobilize that economy towards reproductive justice.

Keywords: fetal tissue, fetal tissue research, abortion, roe v. wade, bioproducts, planned parenthood, bioproperty, informed consent, genetic intellectual property, henrietta lacks, moore v. regents of the university of california, feminism, intersectional feminism, feminist legal theory, radical feminism

JEL Classification: B24, B51, D51, D63, F54, J16, J15, J13, K11, K19, K32, K36, L11, L31, L65, P14, P12, P11, P26, P36,