Our Position

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We know that couples struggling with infertility face great heartbreak, pain, and difficult decisions as they navigate loss from infertility. We recognize the lack of healthcare that women and couples have received as most fertility clinicians bypass the health issues patients are facing, only focusing on the product of a healthy baby. Even if a healthy baby is born, the underlying medical condition of the mother or father remains.

Many couples who struggle with infertility have either one or multiple underlying health conditions which should be addressed through medical care. When these underlying conditions are addressed, the couple can increase their likelihood of achieving pregnancy. While an underlying medical condition is not always causal, it is for many couples. We encourage couples to get a good diagnosis of their personal factors for infertility and seek medical care for those factors.

We support public policy efforts to restore health of the body, care which can also repair fertility. We support technologies that seek to restore natural reproductive health and advise couples considering technological efforts which intentionally bypass the body to exercise caution.

What is Restorative Reproductive Medicine (RRM)?

Restorative reproductive medicine is any scientific approach that seeks to cooperate with, or restore the normal physiology and anatomy of, the human reproductive system, without the use of methods that are inherently suppressive, circumventive, or destructive to natural human functions. It may include ultrasounds, blood tests, hormone panels, laparoscopic and exploratory surgeries, examining the patient’s overall health and lifestyle, elimination of environmental endocrine disruptors; assessment of the health and fertility of a patient’s partner, natural procreative technology, fertility awareness-based methods, and fertility education and medical management.

What is RRM seeking to treat?

RRM seeks to treat Reproductive health conditions, conditions which make successful conception of a child difficult to impossible when conceptions should otherwise be possible, including but not limited to endometriosis, adenomyosis, polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS,) uterine fibroids, blocked fallopian tubes, hormone imbalances, hyperprolactinemia, thyroid conditions, ovulation dysfunctions, and other health conditions that make it difficult or impossible to successfully conceive a child where conception should otherwise be possible.

Current Public Policy Proposals in Discussion Regarding RRM

·    MFC Supports: Requiring the Minnesota Department of Health to provide education on Restorative Reproductive Medicine in its family planning materials, maternal and child health programs, and women’s health initiatives

·    MFC Opposes: Mandatory coverage of IVF by insurance providers, both state (Medical assistance and MinnesotaCare) and private. SF1961/HF1758 (2025)

FAQs

Q: Don’t we want more babies in loving families?

A: It is a natural and good desire of a married man and woman to have children.

From a moral and public policy position, any technological effort to have a child must not involve the creation and sacrifice of other children, the siblings.

Q: Don’t you understand that the country is facing an unprecedented fertility crisis? What other options exist for couples seeking to have children?

A: Yes, the Centers for Disease Control report that in the United States, lowering birth rates have been the trend since the early 2000s. Various factors contribute to these lowered rates, and one significant factor is impaired fertility. Underlying many cases of infertility are various diseases which should receive medical treatment. When couples struggle with infertility and seek care, many providers prescribe IVF exclusively as the solution.

When couples struggle with infertility and seek care, many providers prescribe IVF exclusively without providing care to the patients. IVF bypasses the body to secure the desired product of a child, but it does not heal the body. Reports estimate that IVF accounts for 99% of all assisted reproductive technology treatments. We encourage couples to seek treatment (Restorative Reproductive Medicine) which seeks to heal underlying diseases which impair reproductive function and in turn, often restore fertility.

Q: Should we consider embryo adoption?

A: Although the Assisted Reproduction industry in the United States lacks regulation, estimates have been made on the number of embryonic lives in cryopreservation facilities. The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health estimates, “There are over a million and a half embryos currently frozen across the U.S.” Married couples may be considering whether they are called to adopt a frozen embryonic life.

We first encourage couples to see any adoption not as a response to infertility but as a unique calling to welcome a child into a loving home. While we support couples’ efforts to rescue children from abandonment, there are some things to consider before adopting an embryo:

1. This embryo will be placed into an unrelated woman’s womb. The woman’s body is not prepared to receive the embryo as it would be under natural pregnancy conditions, so her body must be treated to not reject the embryo. This lack of biological relationship creates stress on embryonic life.

2. Seeking to give embryonic babies a chance at life is a beautiful goal. We also encourage married couples to prayerfully consider children who have been born and are waiting for a home in adoption agencies or foster care placement.