MONTGOMERY, Ala. — The Alabama Supreme Court on Friday declined to reconsider a controversial ruling that found frozen embryos are considered children under state law.
The justices, in a 7-2 decision without comment, rejected a request to review the ruling that attracted international attention and prompted fertility clinics to suspend services earlier this year. Alabama judges ruled in February that three couples could file wrongful death lawsuits for their “ectopic children” after their frozen embryos were destroyed in an accident at a storage facility.
The decision sparked a wave of public backlash as women saw fertility treatments canceled or jeopardized after the ruling.
Three clinics have halted IVF services over civil liability concerns raised in the ruling, which treated a frozen embryo the same as a child or pregnant fetus under Alabama wrongful death law. The clinics resumed services after state lawmakers passed legislation protecting providers from civil lawsuits.
Judge Will Sellers said in a dissent that he would have granted the request for a rehearing so they could gather more information.
“The majority opinion on the original filing had significant and far-reaching consequences for individuals completely unrelated to the parties in the case. Many of these individuals had no reason to believe that a legal and routine medical procedure would be delayed, let alone denied, as a result of this Court’s ruling,” Sellers wrote.
The Center for Reproductive Medicine and Mobile Infirmary, the defendants in the lawsuit, had asked judges to hear the issue again.
The Medical Association of the State of Alabama and the Alabama Hospital Association submitted a letter in support of the request. They said that although IVF services have resumed, the decision continues to create a cloud of uncertainty for the medical community.