Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 150
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 151
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Warning (512): Unable to emit headers. Headers sent in file=/home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php line=853 [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 48]
Warning (2): Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php:853) [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 148]
Warning (2): Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php:853) [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 181]
LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Free wombs a tall ask: Medics -GS Mudur

Free wombs a tall ask: Medics -GS Mudur

Share this article Share this article
published Published on Aug 25, 2016   modified Modified on Aug 25, 2016
-The Telegraph

New Delhi: The proposed surrogacy law that prevents women from renting out their wombs for financial gain will be a blow to infertile couples unable to find the service for free, sections of doctors in infertility treatment services said today.

The specialists said a law that insists that a surrogate woman has to be a close relative of the infertile couple would be "impractical" and may also raise the risk of the surrogacy industry, driven by demand, moving underground, spawning illegal transactions.

"An end to commercial surrogacy will be a big blow to many infertile couples," said Sonia Malik, a New Delhi-based senior gynaecologist and the chairperson of the infertility committee of the Federation of Obstetrics and Gynaecological Societies of India.

Infertile couples, Malik said, generally do not discuss in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) or third-party reproduction (surrogacy) with close relatives. "This is kept as secret as possible, particularly from their close family members - so how are they going to find altruistic close relatives?"

Doctors say India's estimated 12 million to 15 million couples constitute a large market for the infertility service sector that provides a range of services, including sperm and ova banking, embryo implantation and surrogate womb services.

Infertility clinics have sprung up in towns across the country but, because the sector has remained largely unregulated, no one has counts of either the number of surrogate transactions conducted in India each year or of the number of IVF procedures.

But many clinics offering surrogacy services have been known to cater to foreign clients. A research paper published last year in the American Journal of Maternal Child Nursing had pointed out that couples from the US can purchase surrogacy for less than one-half or even one-third the costs in the US.

Some gynaecologists have hailed the proposal to end commercial surrogacy transactions, saying the women who lent their wombs were almost always women from poor families and relatively easy to exploit.

"There are networks of agencies and middlemen and such people typically claim most of the money, and the women get very little of the amounts that the infertile couple pays," said Kanad Nayar, the general secretary of the Indian Fertility Society.

But even Nayar is worried about the requirement of only "altruistic" surrogacy. "I think this will be a problem - finding women from within the close family willing to be surrogates will not be easy," he said. "Many infertile couples are likely to find themselves in distress."

Some doctors believe the government's proposals appear to be a "backlash" to the exploitation of reproductive technology by couples and individuals who do not really require it. "This technology, surrogacy, has almost become a social fad," said another member of the Indian Fertility Society.

"There are medical grounds where surrogacy is justified - imagine a woman who has lost her uterus during childbirth or a woman born without a uterus," the gynaecologist said.

A Hissar-based in-vitro fertilisation specialist, Anurag Bishnoi, said the proposed surrogacy law might even lead to break-up of marriages. "I think this will lead to an increase in second marriages - if surrogacy is not allowed, some couples are likely to break up."

The Telegraph, 24 August, 2016, http://www.telegraphindia.com/1160825/jsp/nation/story_104381.jsp#.V76QhBL39sA
 

Write Comments

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

Video Archives

Archives

share on Facebook
Twitter
RSS
Feedback
Read Later

Contact Form

Please enter security code
      Close