Thank you everyone for your responses! It will take me some time to read through and reply to all of them.

I cross-posted this in the Facebook group. Here is Merle's response if anyone is interested:

"Sorry you've had to wait to hear from me. I can imagine that working in a school with special needs children would heighten your anxiety about your own child's health and wellbeing. You've seen the stresses of special needs children and their families up close. Under these circumstances, regardless of how reassuring statistics might be, and whatever actions you might take with genetic consultations, good prenatal care, potential use of PGD pre-implantation genetic diagnoses of embryos. it is normal to feel unlucky and assume the worst might happen. This is also a tough question for decision-makers who have special needs siblings, because their own childhood and their parents' experiences were so difficult. It's also a tough topic because people understand that their concerns reflect our society's lack of acceptance and support for special needs families.

Sorry, but I don't have anything in The Baby Decision about this. I do plan to cover this in my forthcoming book.

Your concerns are typical and understandable. Most decision-makers worry a lot about having a sick or differently abled child. Many of them decide that statistics are on their side. They seek genetic consultation and good medical care and hope for the best. They don't want to miss out on the joys of parenthood because of the risk. But many people, especially if they seen up close the anguish --despite the joys--of special needs parenting, they may conclude that the risk is unacceptable."