Is It Ethical To Pay Drug Addicts To Get Sterilized?

@Mary Ann, sterilization and birth control/reproductive rights are not the same thing. Educating people about birth control options and/or giving women access to birth control is not the same thing as paying a woman not to have children.

I have long advocated this. I also have tried to offer long term birth control instead of monthly payemnts for starving children in (insert country here). Bit no one wants that kind of help. They would rather the children and their mothers suffer and perhaps die, than prevent the problem. I guess it makes for better video.
And when thinking about reproductive "rights", before you shout "Nazi" or "Hitler", remember that we care moe about the breeding of our dogs, our horses and even our dinner, than we care about the breeding of humans.

This is a sick organisation and i am glad it didnt get a foot hold in the UK. They are exploitative, ethically dubious, and morally questionable.

Harris admitted her methods amounted to bribery, but said it was the only way to stop babies being physically and mentally damaged by drugs during pregnancy yet she adopted 4 children herself from drug addicts so she knows this is not always the case.

Instead of giving them money, give them support and help to get them clean. How many people in dire situations have managed to turn their life around because of a glimer of hope, a child. Having someone in your life that you are repsonisble for that depends on you is what some people need in order for them to look after themselves. How many people could this organisation save if it decided to help the addict and not steralise them, what would be the bigger impact for society as a whole.

Read the article below about the first person who used project prevention in the UK and then tell me that you thinks its ok.

http://stuartsorensen.wordpress.com/2012/04/24/interview-with-project-preventions-first-uk-client/

There are plenty of people who should be in front of the drug addicts in the queue. There are plenty of totally useless parents who would not qualify for adoption, but keep on spawning kids.

As a man with heart problems from both sides of his family and is overweight I have to say this is one step closer to needing a permit to breed. And I like it.

There's a huge, huge difference between long-term birth control and sterilization. Offering $300 for a five-year implant is a nice incentive. Encouraging someone with impaired judgment to sell their lifelong reproductive future for $300 is sad and scary.

I know we all think we're so much wiser than "those people," so it's easy to be smug. But at some point we all make a wrong decision. How we respond to those decisions in others says a lot about us, ourselves.

Clearly fat people (or smokers, motorcyclists, etc) aren't capable of making informed decisions about their health either, so they're next on the sterilization list, right? Right?

I could see a recovered addict coming back and suing the people involved in this project years from now when she regrets her decision.

But it seems like a good program. No child should be born addicted to crack.

I agree with Yvonne. And I read this over at the Salon site and they make you give blood in order to comment, so here I am at my fave daily site. Their loss. The Salon article makes the obscene suggestion that this is identical to the "final solution." First, that's an utter lie and second, it's disgustingly vicious. When it is your choice, sterilization is a proactive act of compassion, because you choose to spare another human suffering at your own hand. If self-sterilization were really a slippery slope to eugenics, it would have happened a long time ago.

Next up, Eugenics!

DX---Where are you donating the money? I hope it's going to foster children....they are the ones who lose out when druggies get pregnant. And 95% of the time, they don't WANT to have a baby in that situation, they just can't remember to do birth control, drugs come first. I wish someone would find a way to REALLY do rehab. I mean, a way that works better. Of course, if your life sucks, being on something seems OK, right? I had a brother who spent much of his life on something...when he was eventually sober, it had zapped his body so much that he died of a massive heart attack at 50. I would have given ANYTHING if I could have 'healed" him.

I just donated $10 for each comment made against sterilization and will do the same for any new comments--keep 'em coming!

Totally ignores the fact that STDs are also a byproduct of poor sexual choices. Could lead someone to have more sex than they would normally, since they're under a false impression of invulnerability.

Ignoring the f:m ratio, so long as it's not permanent I have absolutely no trouble with this. When I was born, there were about 5bn people, now there are nearly 7bn. I've no intention of having more than one or two kids myself, I'd sign up for a while.

help control the people population- have the stupid people spayed or neutered. I am not saying drug addicts are all stupid people- but wouldn't it be great to stop all the stupid people from breeding? all i'm seeing these days... maybe they should expand their program.

I think it's a great idea. It eliminates a horrible problem. The world doesn't need another meth or crack baby.

Seems like a great program. Look, it's not targeting people based on their genetic makeup, it's targeting those who have clearly demonstrated that they've made exceptionally poor life choices.

I have no sympathy whatsoever for someone who would get fixed for a fix. That's pretty much the best thing they could sell to society, do for themselves, and do for their potential future children in exchange for more drugs.

As for the notion that the program would be taking advantage of people in a diminished mental capacity, they willingly put themselves in that state. I'd consider them extremely fortunate if that's the worst long-term decision a junkie makes.

The only problem I would have with the program is if it focused primarily on women and not male junkies as well, even though the government is probably just trying to stop having to pay out child benefits to junkies who got pregnant. I bet men would take as little as $50 to get snipped, which would be perfectly fair considering how much more minor the surgery is.

I love how it's $300 cash because they know the addicts are just going to immediately spend it on crack or black tar heroin.

If they are willing to make that decision when they are high, then they should have to deal with the consequences down the road. Just like if you were to kill someone while drinking and driving.

An addict will do many things to support a habit that a non addict can not comprehend. In the throes of addiction, reason and logic give way to perceived necessity..

This program mirrors our early eugenics movement with the illusion of choice.

It should be stopped immediately.

for once, can society agree that the rights of the children are more important than the rights of the parents? so many people think they can make mistakes with children and just sweep them under the rug.

sounds like a good idea!

sounds like a great deal. But it's not fair that you have to get addicted to drugs first.

I guess for drug addicts who never plan to have children, they'd make some easy money.

Keeping in mind that ethics are entirely subjective, and this is really nothing more than personal opinion.... personally I see nothing wrong with it. The way I see it, if the individual isn't entirely lucid when they make this choice, and are already so desperate as to go this route to begin with (without concern for the long term effects or even immediate consequences) - they are going to make one of two "bad" choices anyhow, and the one has a more dramatic long-lasting effect on others and society. If they are lucid, then they are well within their rights to make this choice anyway.

In short I agree with the sentiment expressed on their web site: "If you can not trust someone with their reproductive choices, how can you trust them with a child?"

Now, just how reasonable that all is is also depends somewhat on how the entire process is handled to begin with, and that I don't know.

I have to agree with Yvonne. If it's temporary, then I'm for it. If they want children down the road when hopefully they are better, then they should have the oppurtunity.

As a former teacher of those children of the inner city, as long as the sterilization is temporary, I have no problem with it. The children are starving, and usually have little care; no one else wants them. When Mom is lucid, she regrets what she is doing, but is powerless when under the drugs' power. As long as nothing is permanent, I see no problem.