Affiliated Scholars

Nanette Elster, J.D., M.P.H.
Affiliated Scholar

Nanette Elster is a partner at Spence & Elster, P.C., a Chicago-area law firm working in the area of fertility law. Elster has extensive experience in legal, public health, and ethical issues related to women's and children's health, and has been on faculty at the Institute for Health, Law and Policy, University of Illinois at Chicago School of Medicine, and Chicago-Kent College of Law.

Elster has spoken nationally and internationally, and she is the author of numerous articles on genetic and reproductive health with a particular focus on legal and ethical implications, including: "ARTistic License: Should Assisted Reproductive Technologies be Regulated?" in ART: Today and Beyond, edited by Christopher DeJonge and Christopher Barratt; "Stem Cell Research: Ethical Issues for Women in Donating Eggs and Embryos" in Human Rights; "HIV and ART: Reproductive Choices and Challenges" in The Journal of Contemporary Health Law and Policy (2003); "Assisted Reproductive Technologies: Contracts, Consents & Controversies" in the American Journal of Family Law; "Future Uses of Residual Newborn Blood Spots" in Jurimetrics; and "ART for the Masses? Racial and Ethnic Inequality in Assisted Reproductive Technologies" in DePaul Health Law Journal.

Currently, Elster serves on the advisory board of the Chicago Center for Jewish Genetic Disorders. In addition, she served for three years as an ad hoc member of the ABA Coordinating Group on Bioethics and the Law.

Elster holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, a law degree from Loyola University School of Law, and a Master of Public Health degree from Boston University School of Public Health.