NC Republicans look to define life at fertilization in bill unlikely to pass

RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) — A bill in the General Assembly could drastically change access to IVF services and abortion laws in the state.

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Republicans introduced House Bill 1232. It looks to amend the state Constitution to define life as happening at the moment of fertilization. That means it would be a long process.

Republicans would need to pass the bill, get the Constitutional amendment on voters’ ballots in November and then have the amendment pass.

If all of that happened, legally, it would mean a few things.

First and foremost, anyone who purposely terminates a fertilized egg, so say by abortion, could be charged with first-degree murder. It would also have major impacts for families in the state who use IVF for conception because oftentimes embryos are frozen and sometimes eventually discarded.

The bill is very unlikely to actually see any movement, but Democrats aren’t taking any chances as they push back against this bill and similar ones looking to restrict access to reproductive healthcare.

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“This is compassionate healthcare to help people build families and have control over their bodies and their futures. We should be funding this, mandating that insurance covers this. We should be affirming IVF as a right for North Carolinians, not trying to take it away in ways that are unscientific and discriminatory,” Democratic Senator Sophia Chitlik said.

We did reach out to Republican leadership in the House and haven’t heard back. We also reached out to Planned Parenthood, as they are one of the largest providers of reproductive healthcare in the state, but they said since the bill is unlikely to move, they didn’t want to comment.

If the bill did pass in the General Assembly and was passed by voters, it would go into effect next year.

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