I am interested in the ability to transplant fetuses from one mother to another in order to resolve the current issue we have with abortion. It is my belief that by doing this, we can give both parties a solution to the problem that we all could live with. During my research I came across a seemingly knowledgeable person who educated me about the biological model of the maternal-fetal interface. Despite the differences between the fetal tissue and maternal tissue, the fetus manages to attach itself and not be rejected by the mother. We now understand immunology to understand why site rejection doesn't occur, though we do not understand the mechanism completely. This is called the fetal semi-allograft theory.
There is a hormonal exchange that occurs between the new cells and the maternal cells at the attachment point that prevent rejection by the host (mother.) This series of exchanges sets up a cross immunity between mother and unborn child. Over time, and the exchange of hormonal messengers, the attachment point develops into an umbilical system that taps into the mother's blood supply to provide her child with nutrients. Without this cross immunity, both would die in the resulting systemic histamine reactions. Leukocytes from both mother and child would relentlessly attack each other until both would perish. It is impossible to be nothing less than awed by the delicate ballet of chemical interactions and the beauty of the result of reproduction.
It is useful at times to look at the combination of fetus and mother as one organism, for the purposes of doing medicine and diagnosing conditions. Just as sometimes it is handy to look at a given system in different ways in order to derive solutions to different problems. It might be useful to look at conjoined twins as a single organism for the purposes of diagnosis since they might share organs for example. That does not mean that they are not two separate individuals.
Which brings me back to the individual that educated me about this theory, Eileen E. She apparently has a website where she tries to draw consequences for the individuality for the fetus from a medical model. Eileen states,
With this concept the woman and her fetus are represented as a single organism which could be referred to as the "Pregnancy Unit" as the textbook Williams Obstetrics does...I find it very hard for this person to derive a concept of what constitutes an individual from a medical model for practicing obstetrics. Just as very few people would consider conjoined twins to be a single individual, it might be useful to treat them as one when practicing medicine. I'm sure for obstetrics purposes treating the fetal-allograft as a single pregnancy unit might be useful, since mother and child would act as one unit. This is not a justification for politicizing a medical model to justify abortion as this author apparently does.
No evidence based practitioner nor scientist wants a medical model used for pushing a particular agenda out of context. In this case, I'm afraid this is what Eileen is doing. What's worse is this is exactly what the Nazi scientists did as well. When individuals do this, they truly do a disservice by delegitimizing the research and models for practicing medicine. It simply makes it harder for practitioners to do their job.
