Medicine: Stand

Is artificial insemination decent? Is it humane? One obstetrician who thinks it is both is Johns Hopkins’ Dr. Alan F. Guttmacher. Of the 60 cases of artificial insemination presided over in the last decade by Dr. Guttmacher, 34 have resulted in pregnancies. Last week, at a meeting of the Ohio State Medical Association in Cleveland, Dr. Guttmacher discussed and defended his work.

He follows a six-point rule of his own: 1) donor and recipient must remain absolutely unknown to each other; 2) both patient and husband must approve, and need no urging from either the physician or from each other; 3) the practice must not become available to all who ask for it—the doctor must know donor and recipient well; 4) fees must be kept low, to eliminate mercenary motives; 5) the legal father, not the biological father, must be listed on the birth certificate; 6) signed papers must be kept to a minimum—or, better still, eliminated.

The most recent attack on artificial insemination was made at a symposium sponsored by the Chicago Institute of Medicine and the Chicago Bar Association. Last week Dr. Guttmacher replied:

“It was declared that [artificial insemination] was illegal, that it was adultery, and that signed papers would not remove it from that scope. I think that is inexcusable. . . . The wife’s motive is to escape adultery by having her baby by a decent means.

I refuse to let my work be interfered with by such legal folderol. If a person entering the practice of medicine were always considering whether he’d be sued or not, he’d be nothing but a pussyfooter. I have no criminal intent. The woman and her husband have no criminal intent. To me it is a decent and humane act, and I stand by it.”