Hope Springs Maternal

I read Alison Motluk’s “The Human Egg Trade” (April) with consternation. For twenty-five years, I watched the Canadian government spend millions of dollars and countless hours working toward reining in controversial practices in assisted human reproduction. The result? Heavy-handed legislation that makes it a federal crime to buy or sell gametes — which, as Motluk makes clear, is rarely enforced.

This has led to discrepancies in practice. Some infertile couples and their doctors have chosen to ignore the law, while at the Toronto Centre for Advanced Reproductive Technology, where I serve as medical director, we follow it, much to the dismay of patients who cannot arrange altruistic egg donations. (“Reproductive tourism” is the result of this scarcity: Canadian couples now flock to countries where donation is unregulated, at great financial and logistical expense.)

This leaves competent, responsible physicians across the country in a no-win situation: either yield to patients’ wishes and disregard the law, or bow to a government unconvinced of its own legislation. It is time for consistency.

Robert F. Casper, MD
Professor, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of Toronto
Toronto, ON

Alison Motluk’s piece exposed what many of us in the fertility profession already know: Canada’s law against reasonable egg donor compensation is a bit of a joke. I am a Canadian fertility specialist practising in the United States, and I was a member of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine’s ethics committee when it issued a statement arguing that financial compensation — up to $5,000 (US) — for egg donors is justified on ethical grounds. And so I agree that the current Canadian system does a disservice to patients, donors, and physicians.

Of course, we need to educate those involved to prevent bad decisions and ensure best clinical practices. But the implication that Canadian women are somehow incapable of considering the risks of egg donation on their own is, frankly, insulting.

Paula Amato, MD
Portland, Oregon

I’m sure you’ve already received dozens of letters about the cover of your April issue, so I’ll spare you a long-winded explanation of the problems with equating the sale of human eggs with the sale of newborn infants. I’ll avoid getting pedantic about the many biological differences between ova and children, and I will certainly refrain from pointing out that the failure to recognize these differences underlies the belief that contraceptive users are murderers for having denied the ovum-child the opportunity to live.

I’m writing instead to wish you all a nice day, and to show off the awesome typewriter a friend gave me recently.

Pretty cool, eh?

Ben Coli
Vancouver, BC

Bearing Witness

Steven Heighton’s “Bystanders” (April) was based on an incident that occurred along Nangpa Pass in the fall of 2006 and went largely unreported in the North American press. A large group of Tibetan pilgrims, including several children, were travelling out of Tibet through waist-deep snow when Chinese soldiers opened fire, killing several of them.

This happened in full view of a guided Western climbing expedition, whose leader, fearing repercussions if the incident were publicized, avoided reporting it. Several guides risked their jobs by leaking the story.

Heighton’s fictionalized account shows us that bystanders are morally implicated, a principle that is too often forgotten. Many thanks to him for making us think. Now all we have to do is act.

Greg Maurer
Port Moody, BC

Northern Exposure

As a university-level English instructor at Yukon College in Whitehorse, I read Jessa Gamble’s piece on Dechinta Bush University (“Higher Learning,” April) with great interest. Three paragraphs in, however, I was surprised and a little irritated by the claim that the three northern colleges (Yukon College, Aurora College, and Nunavut Arctic College) offer only “high school equivalency and training for industry jobs.”

Without a doubt, these are key components of all three institutions. However, Yukon College offers a solid slate of first- and second-year courses in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities (and has well-established transfer agreements with schools that offer undergraduate degrees). All in all, the college provides a firm post-secondary foundation, close to home and at a relatively low cost.

Gamble’s short sell left me wondering what role the pre-existing northern colleges might play in the formation of a northern university. If Canadian policy-makers are taking l’idée d’U Nord seriously, why don’t they build on what’s already here, and establish a northern university with the infrastructure, curricula, and transfer agreements that northern colleges have worked for years to develop?

Andrew Richardson
School of Liberal Arts
Yukon College
Whitehorse, YT

Reform School

I am the CFO of a regional health authority in Manitoba, and I read Mindy Hung’s essay “Healthy Competition?” (April) shortly after trying to discuss American health care in an online forum for medical professionals. After posting carefully researched arguments in favour of reform, I was subjected to a barrage of jingoistic, free market–influenced rebuttals based only on anecdote and dotted with capital letters and exclamation marks. My American opponents eventually settled on one condemnation — I was liberal — and that was the end of the discussion.

As Hung concludes, correctly, we stop debating at our own peril. But is there any hope for meaningful dialogue when these attitudes prevail? The American health care system is approximately two-thirds private, and the Canadian system is approximately two-thirds public. We have a lot to learn from each other. It’s time to open our minds and talk rationally.

Ron Janzen
Steinbach, MB

In Poor Taste

You might have thought Jason Sherman and David Parkins’ comic “The Walrus Presents... The Proroguey Thing” (April) was very clever. I find it offensive. No national leader, especially not our own, deserves this sort of disrespect. Despite what you think, we are very fortunate to have this government. Please cancel my subscription.

Maia O. Scott
Toronto, ON