Iowa Republicans block personhood bill that could have threatened IVF from advancing

Iowa Republicans have blocked a personhood bill from advancing in the Legislature that would have made it a felony offense to “cause the death” of an “unborn person” — language that prompted concerns that the measure would criminalize in vitro fertilization.

The bill had passed the GOP-controlled state House last week, but the Republican-led Senate declined to take up the bill after the chairman of the state Senate committee that would have initially debated it refused to do so.

State Sen. Brad Zaun, the chair of the chamber’s Judiciary Committee, told the Associated Press that he didn’t advance the bill during the committee's meeting on Wednesday, its last before a Friday legislative deadline, due to concerns over “unintended consequences” the measure could end up creating for IVF care in the state.

Zaun didn’t immediately respond to questions from NBC News.

The bill criminalizing the death of an "unborn person" did not provide any protections for embryos created via IVF. Democrats and reproductive rights advocates said that meant the measure could easily be interpreted to criminalize IFV care and services.

The state House's passage of the bill quickly inserted the conservative midwestern state directly into the national battle over protections for IVF.

The vote in Iowa last Thursday came just hours after Republican lawmakers in Alabama — trying to curtail the severe fallout over a state Supreme Court ruling that equated embryos with children — enacted a bill intended to protect IVF. The Alabama court’s ruling prompted broader concerns that conservative measures targeting abortion elsewhere would also go after the fertility procedure.

The Iowa bill stated that “a person who causes the death of an unborn person without