Claim: Anti-abortion groups are claiming every sperm cell is "a life.
Verdict: REFUTES

Retrieved passages:
title: Every Life Counts
text: selected as one of the groups to make a presentation to the members of the Citizens' Assembly Every Life Counts Every Life Counts is a campaign and support network for families whose child is diagnosed with fatal foetal abnormalities, and an anti-abortion campaign group in Ireland. They campaign for the creation of a perinatal hospice in Ireland, as an opposition to abortion in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities, claiming it is not a "pathway to healing", and that abortion causes depression and distress. They are opposed to the term ""fatal foetal abnormalities"" or ""incompatible with life"" calling it an "ugly

title: Philosophical aspects of the abortion debate
text: (or perhaps a sperm and ovum jointly) have a future like ours, contraception would be as wrong as murder; but as this conclusion is (it is said) absurd—even those who believe contraception is wrong do not believe it is as wrong as murder—the argument must be unsound. One response is that neither the sperm, nor the egg, nor any particular sperm-egg combination, will ever "itself" live out a valuable future: what will later have valuable experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments is a "new entity", a "new organism", that will come into existence at or near conception; and it is "this"

title: Every Life Counts
text: abnormalities"" (e.g. Patau syndrome Trisomy 13), live for many years after birth. In 2015, members addressed the "Rally for Life", a pro-life protest organised by Youth Defence and the Life Institute, to speak about abortion. After the 2016 Mellet v Ireland UN case, they claimed the United Nations Human Rights Committee "deliberately ignored the experiences of families who had received great joy and love from carrying their babies to term" They made a submission to the Citizens' Assembly, which discussed Ireland's abortion laws, where they claimed that abortion is not a solution to a fatal foetal abnormalities diagnosis. They were

title: United States anti-abortion movement
text: have an anti-abortion theme. Choose Life, an advocacy group founded in 1997, was successful in securing an anti-abortion automobile tag in Florida. Subsequently, the organization has been actively helping groups in other states pursue "Choose Life" license plates. Some anti-abortion organizations and individuals disseminate false medical information and unsupported pseudoscientific claims about alleged physical and mental health risks of abortion. Many right-to-life organizations claim that abortion damages future fertility, or causes breast cancer, which is contradicted by the medical professional organizations. Some states, such as Alaska, Mississippi, West Virginia, Texas, and Kansas, have passed laws requiring abortion providers to warn

title: United States anti-abortion movement
text: to begin at fertilization, they refer to these contraceptives as abortifacients because they cause the embryo to starve. An embryo gets its nourishment off the uterine wall and dies if not attached. The Catholic Church endorses this view, but the possibility that hormonal contraception has post-fertilization effects is disputed within the scientific community, including some anti-abortion physicians. Attachment to an anti-abortion position is often but not exclusively connected to religious beliefs about the sanctity of life (see also culture of life). Exclusively secular-humanist positions against abortion tend to be a minority viewpoint among anti-abortion advocates; these groups say that their

title: Every Life Counts
text: Every Life Counts Every Life Counts is a campaign and support network for families whose child is diagnosed with fatal foetal abnormalities, and an anti-abortion campaign group in Ireland. They campaign for the creation of a perinatal hospice in Ireland, as an opposition to abortion in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities, claiming it is not a "pathway to healing", and that abortion causes depression and distress. They are opposed to the term ""fatal foetal abnormalities"" or ""incompatible with life"" calling it an "ugly term", preferring the term ""life limiting condition"". The point out that some people diagnosed with ""fatal foetal

title: Life (UK organisation)
text: the human embryo, while the 1990s saw the creation of a professionalised and centralised LIFE Housing department able to co-ordinate closely with local authorities and social services. Life also has links to pro-life groups in other countries, notably Malta, Sri Lanka and the Republic of Ireland. Although access to abortion is heavily restricted in Northern Ireland – much more so than in the rest of the UK – there are a number of active local Life groups in the region. Although it co-operates with faith groups in some areas of its work, Life has no religious affiliations, and its views

title: Schlesinger Institute
text: through Rishonim and Acharonim. It covers thousands of rulings from halachic literature, including up-to-date material from contemporary authorities all over the world such as Rav M. Feinstein, Rav Sh.Z. Auerbach, Rav Waldenberg, Rav Eliashiv, Rav Ovadia Yosef, Rav Wosner and Rav Neuwirth. Problems are covered as far-ranging as the doctor and patient on weekdays and Shabbat, Yom Kippur and Pesach, in the hospital or at home, hospice, end of life and brain death, pregnancy and assisted reproduction, contraception and abortion, brit milah and the medical problems of niddah, medical malpractice and claims, genetic engineering and cloning, DNA and stem cells,

title: Secular Pro-Life
text: option. Their fetal personhood argument states that a fetus is a human being recognized as a person that possesses human rights, and that the concept of bodily autonomy of mothers does not permit abortions in the majority of circumstances. SPL does not have a position on abortion in the case of rape. SPL is in favor of barrier-based contraception, along with any other form of contraception that prevents fertilization but does not prevent the implantation of the blastocyst, and the organization also supports sex education. While geared towards the non-religious, Secular Pro-Life states that they are open to religious believers,

title: Pro-Life Alliance of Gays and Lesbians
text: shows a link between abortion and breast cancer that has generally been rejected by the medical community. They have also taken the position that even if a woman is infected with HIV she should not abort the fetus because there are ways to prevent the transmission of the virus from the mother. They support expanding access to antiretroviral drugs for all people who need such treatment, including pregnant women and their fetuses. In March 2005, PLAGAL came out in support of legislation introduced by Maine state legislator Brian Duprey, which assuming that science would discover a significant genetic component to

title: Life (UK organisation)
text: on ethical issues are not based on the teachings of any religion. In May 2011 the Conservative government caused controversy when it appointed Life to its advisory group the Sexual Health Forum, replacing the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS). Ann Furedi, the chief executive of BPAS, said: "We find it puzzling that the Department of Health would want a group that is opposed to abortion and provides no sexual health services on its sexual health forum." Life did subsequently note that they work in schools to promote healthy sexual attitudes and behaviour. Life has an absolutist view on abortion –

title: Anti-abortion movement
text: organizations "Derecho a vivir" (right to life) and "Hazteoir" (make yourself heard). In the United Kingdom, the most prominent anti-abortion organization is the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children. It was formed to "uphold the principle of respect for human life, in particular the life of the unborn child" at the time of the passage of the 1967 Abortion Act which liberalized abortion law. It was the first such organization in the world. In Israel, the major anti-abortion organization is Efrat. Efrat activists primarily raise funds to relieve the "financial and social pressures" on pregnant women so that they

title: Every Sperm Is Sacred
text: the Protestant married couple with Palin playing the Protestant husband. The very phrase "every sperm is sacred" has become almost proverbial in the field of animal and human sexuality and reproduction. This extends to such areas as cloning, where the song is used to criticize anti-cloning activists who argue that every embryo or fertilized egg is sacred. Pro-choice activists have sung the song outside abortion clinics to ridicule their opponents, legal scholars have alluded to it in discussions of women's reproductive rights, and it is used generally to do what has been described as "[exposing] the absurdity of the anti-choice

title: Anti-abortion violence
text: debate, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the "posters" constituted an illegal threat. The American Life League issued a "Pro-life Proclamation Against Violence" in 2006. Other anti-abortion groups to state their opposition to violence include the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform and Pro-Lifers Against Clinic Violence. The anti-abortion organization National Coalition for Life and Peace has also issued a statement rejecting violence as a form of opposition to abortion. Many anti-abortion organizations—including Family Research Council, Americans United for Life, Concerned Women for America, Susan B. Anthony List, American Life League, Students for Life of America, Pro-Life Action League and

title: Life (UK organisation)
text: of the operation. Life opposes all medical technologies that involve the destruction of human embryos. In line with its views on the fundamental value of human life, the charity is also opposed to all forms of legal assisted suicide and euthanasia. In accordance with its charitable status, Life does not undertake political campaigning in its own right. Nevertheless, the organisation has been associated with the Alive and Kicking Campaign, an umbrella group of pro-life organisations pressing for wide-ranging abortion law reform, and the Care Not Killing Alliance, a coalition of anti-euthanasia campaigners from many different backgrounds, including pro-life organisations, parliamentarians,

title: Virginia Society for Human Life
text: issued the following statement: "VSHL takes no position on the prevention of fertilization, i.e. the union of the sperm and the egg cell. Once fertilization has occurred, a new human life has begun and VSHL is opposed to destroying human life." In 2011, VSHL was involved in the passage of a bill to regulate abortion clinics as "ambulatory surgical centers". The bill, which passed the House by a large margin and passed the Senate after a tiebreaker vote from Lieutenant Governor Bill Bolling, contributed to the closure of three of the state's 21 abortion clinics between its enactment in 2011

title: Abortion and Christianity
text: themselves allied with the Catholic Church which remained staunchly anti-abortion. The Catholic Church teaches that "human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception." Accordingly, it opposes procedures whose purpose is to destroy an embryo or fetus for whatever motive (even before implantation), but admits acts, such as chemotherapy or hysterectomy of a pregnant woman who has cervical cancer, which indirectly result in the death of the fetus. The Church holds that "the first right of the human person is his life" and that life is assumed to begin at fertilization. As such, Canon 1398 provides

title: Beginning of human personhood
text: referred to as fertilization. For fertilization to take place and a baby to begin growing, the sperm cell must come in direct contact with the egg cell." Similarly, a textbook used in Evanston, Illinois stated: "Life begins when a sperm cell and an ovum (egg cell) unite." Catholic philosopher Peter Kreeft goes so far as to say: Well, every biology textbook in the world, before "Roe v. Wade", was not in doubt in answering the question, "When does an individual life of any mammalian species begin?" The answer is, "When the genetic code is complete." When instead of the haploid

title: Right to life
text: organizational model that would separate the NRLC from the direct oversight of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and by early 1973 NRLC Director Fr. James T. McHugh and his executive assistant, Michael Taylor, proposed a different plan, facilitating the NRLC move toward its independence from the Roman Catholic Church. Anti-abortion advocates argue that prenatal humans have the same fundamental "right to life" from the moment of conception that humans have after their birth. Although advocates who identify themselves as "pro-life" generally accept that women have a right to bodily autonomy, they deny that right entitles the women to violate

title: United States anti-abortion movement
text: United States anti-abortion movement The United States anti-abortion movement (or the pro-life movement or right-to-life movement) contains elements opposing elective or therapeutic abortion on both moral and sectarian grounds and supports its legal prohibition or restriction. Advocates generally argue that human life begins at conception and that the human zygote (or embryo or fetus) is a person and therefore has a right to life. The anti-abortion movement includes a variety of organizations, with no single centralized decision-making body. There are diverse arguments and rationales for the anti-abortion stance. Some anti-abortion activists concede arguments for permissible abortions, including therapeutic abortions, in