BY ALANDER ROCHA
A Mobile County court has been asked to review the constitutionality of a law intended to protect IVF services in Alabama.
Jamie Heard’s journey through in vitro fertilization has been fraught with emotional highs and lows.
Uncertainty has been a big factor.
Just days after starting her second IVF cycle in February, she learned that an Alabama Supreme Court decision classifying frozen embryos as children had suspended all treatments at her clinic. The Alabama Legislature moved quickly to pass a bill during the session to protect IVF.
A few months later, she’s back on track for pregnancy, but uncertainty remains.
The Supreme Court’s ruling stemmed from a lawsuit brought by parents against a Mobile clinic where frozen embryos had been destroyed without authorization in 2020. The ruling declared the embryos were children and that parents could seek civil damages for their destruction under an 1872 state law.
