There
is a woman who cannot have children. The doctors examined her and
discovered that her eggs were dead. They did an operation to transplant
eggs and she became pregnant with four embryos. When the doctors
discovered this and told her husband, he said that he did not want four
children, because his wife might get too tired. He told them to abort two
of them and leave two. The doctors said, “We will not do that unless we
have a fatwa from Shaykh Muhammad ibn Saalih al-‘Uthaymeen.” The
pregnancy has already lasted three months, so is it permissible for the
doctors to do this operation, since they have agreed to wait for your
opinion?
Praise be to Allah.
We
will not speak here about the operation to transplant eggs, since the
matter is finished with in this case. With regard to aborting some of the
foetuses which are in her womb, if there is any fear for the mother’s
life and the fourth month of the pregnancy has not passed, then it is OK;
if the pregnancy is past four months, then it is not permissible to abort
any of the foetuses under any circumstances.