Abstract
Rising tuition costs have forced university students to become creative in finding ways to fund their education. Some female university students have decided that ova donation may be an acceptable alternative in which to pay for their tuition. This alternative presents itself because of the insufficient number of ova available for assisted reproduction and emerging stem cell technologies. Young female university students are encouraged by Internet sources and respectable electronic and print media to donate their ova in the cause of assisted reproduction for monetary compensation. While university students generally exhibit autonomy, the constraining influence of their financial predicament compromises the elements of informed consent (voluntariness, competence, capacity, understanding, and disclosure) as to their making an autonomous decision in regard to egg donation. Thus, any moral possibility of giving informed consent is negated. Informed consent can only occur through autonomy. A female university student in need of financial resources to pay for her education cannot make an autonomous choice to trade her genes for tuition. Donated ova are not only needed for assisted reproduction, but for stem cell technologies. While the long-term health of women who donate their ova is of concern (a potential risk of cancer after long term use of ovulation induction), of equal concern is the possibility of a growth in the trade of ova targeting third world and Eastern European women where the precedence for autonomy and informed consent is not well established.
Highlights
Tuition costs are rising dramatically in the United States [1]
Informed consent can only occur through autonomy
A young woman who is a university student in need of financial resources to pay her tuition cannot be free of controlling influences by definition of her social and financial position, she cannot make the autonomous choice to trade her genes for tuition
Summary
Tuition costs are rising dramatically in the United States [1]. Higher education costs, especially those of private and professional institutions, may exceed $40,000 per annum in tuition, room, board, and books. Female students concerned about tuition costs, who decide to submit to egg donation for remuneration to defray such costs, can neither make an autonomous choice nor give informed consent. There is little doubt in the minds of most people that a physician would perform the act of disclosure when speaking with a university student in regard to her donation of eggs and adhere to the above core set of information. The "subjective standard" is the moral example of choice when it comes to disclosure This standard caters to the specific needs of information that are required by an individual, as opposed to the ideal "reasonable person".
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