The issue of women being surrogate mother's is a controversial one at the best of times.
In many western countries women are being surrogates for
altruistic reasons.
In many 3rd world countries surrogacy is about money.
What we know is that today, globally, 15% of couples suffer from infertility problems and seek help.
We also know that 6% of children are born using reproductive technologies.
So the need for surrogacy is there BUT do we as societies want it?
De we need government regulation?
Do we need to allow women to decide what they will do with their bodies?
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0403/p01s04-wosc.html
Childless couples look to India for surrogate mothers
By Anuj Chopra | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
ANAND, INDIA –
Eight months pregnant, Reshma is like any other expecting mother, except that the child she's carrying isn't her own. When Reshma gives birth next month in this small Indian town, the newborn will be immediately handed over to its biological parents, non-resident Indians who live in London and who have been unable to bear a child on their own. In return for renting her womb, Reshma will be paid $2,800 - a significant sum by Indian standards.
"I have two cherubic children of my own," says Reshma, who withheld her real name for fear of disapproval by neighbors. "That couple has none. Imagine how much happiness this baby will give them."
A year ago, the couple flew down from London to this dusty, unremarkable town to choose a surrogate mother. They are part of a growing number of childless foreigners beating a track to India, drawn here for many of the same reasons that have made India a top destination for medical tourism: low costs, highly-qualified doctors, and a more relaxed legal atmosphere.
The industry is estimated to be valued at $449 million, and the number of cases of surrogacy are believed to have doubled in the last three years based on newspaper
classifieds and inquiries at clinics. But hard numbers remains elusive, partly because the practice is defused among small towns like Anand, where the lure of money is stronger than in wealthier cities.
The extent of the practice in the US is similarly unclear. One 1989 estimate by the Detroit News said that $33 million had been spent over the decade for surrogates. A 1992 estimate calculated that as many as 4,000 babies have been born to surrogate mothers in the US.
The cost differences are clear-cut, however. In the US, surrogate mothers are typically paid $15,000, and agencies claim another $30,000. In India, the entire costs range from $2,500 to $6,500.
Dr. Nayna Patel, director of Anand's Kaival Hospital, cautions against seeing the trend in financially exploitative terms. "This is not the same thing as donating a kidney [for money].... A nine-month pregnancy can never be forced," she says. "Beyond the commercial angle, having a child is a deeply emotional issue."
She cites dozens of cases of couples that have spent a small fortune on failed in-vitro fertilizations or experienced repeated miscarriages and have had no option but to turn to surrogacy.
After two fruitless years of searching in Britain, including putting an offer on their car windshield offering $17,000 for a surrogate, Bobby and Kalwinder Bains took out advertisements in Indian newspapers. The couple has found an Indian surrogate mother, who they are paying $720 for implantation of the embryo, $9,000 if she conceives and delivers their baby, and double that if she delivers another baby next year.
"These amounts are still nearly three times cheaper than what surrogacy in the UK would cost us," they say.
Their search put them in touch with several interested Indian mothers. Now the couple has started www.1-in-6.com, a website to help link up prospective parents and surrogate mothers from India.
Research at the Centre for Family Research at Cambridge University shows that British surrogate mothers did not suffer major emotional problems. "We did find that surrogate mothers did find the weeks following the handover difficult, but this became easier over time," says Vasanti Jadva, a researcher from the same university.
It's a view that resonates with fertility specialists like Dr. Patel: "Many surrogate mothers see this not as 'handing over' the baby, but as 'handing back' the baby, as the baby was never theirs to keep."
Anand's Kaival Hospital has up to 20 surrogate mothers. In the last two years since surrogacy began here, six babies have been delivered and two more are on the way. Some 75 percent of the clients are non-resident Indians from the UK, the US, Japan, and Southeast Asia.
Each day, dozens of inquiries from India and abroad inundate the clinic. Parents and prospective surrogates are carefully screened and counseled by the clinic, and both parties must sign an elaborate legal contract that signs over the surrogate mother's rights to the baby and underlines the financial terms.
Although all surrogates interviewed said that they would not get attached to the baby since they took up surrogacy for altruistic reasons, money does seem to be a motivator.
"How else will us uneducated women earn this kind of money, without doing anything immoral?" asks one of the surrogate mothers at the Kaival Hospital.
Reshma's husband Vinod - not his real name - says his paltry $50 montly pay as a painter would not be enough to educate his two children. He says the extra money will allow him to invest in his children's education and to buy a new home. But surrogacy is yet to be widely accepted here. For the past six months, Reshma and Vinod have been living in a neighboring village to keep the pregnancy a secret.
"Otherwise, we'll be treated like social pariahs," he says. "This isn't a respectable thing to do in our society."
Nor is it entirely accepted in other parts of the globe. Movements to allow for surrogate motherhood have been rejected by voters in places like Sweden, Spain, France, and Germany. Other nations that do allow it, including South Africa, the UK, and Argentina, employ independent ethics committees to evaluate surrogacy requests on a case-by-case basis.
"After IT services it seems it's now the turn of babies to be outsourced from India," says Manish Mehta, a reporter from Associated Press Television who is shooting a film on surrogate mothers.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=480230&in_page_id=1770
Britain's most prolific surrogate mother is expecting again - and this time it's triplets
By JAMES MILLS - More by this author » Last updated at 09:22am on 6th September 2007
After eight surrogate pregnancies in little more than a decade, you might think that Carole
Horlock would have tired of giving birth.
But Britain's most prolific surrogate mother is expecting again - and this time it's triplets.
Miss Horlock, who will be 41 next month, is eight weeks into the pregnancy for a married woman left infertile after cancer.
Carole Horlockwith the surrogate son she had in 2004
She has already had nine babies for childless couples, including one set of twins, and has had two daughters of her own.
Yesterday she spoke of her pride at the prospect of taking her total of made-to-order babies into double figures.
"I get a real and genuine pleasure from helping couples who can't conceive naturally," she said.
"For me, it is a wonderful experience.
"I like being pregnant.
"I can become pregnant very easily and I don't have a problem handing the babies over after they are born."
But Miss Horlock's experiences since her first surrogacy agreement in 1995 have not all been positive.
Her father barely speaks to her.
As she usually uses her own eggs - which she artificially inseminates herself with the father's sperm - he is distressed that she is effectively giving away his grandchildren.
And although she has good relationships with most of the couples she has helped, she has had a falling out with the last couple whose son she gave birth to in June 2004.
She believed she had successfully inseminated herself with the husband's sperm, but discovered - to the horror of all concerned - that she had in fact become pregnant by her partner of nine years, mechanic Paul Brown, 50.
She said: "We had taken precautions but something went wrong.
"It was an extremely difficult time but there was no way that I would have gone back on the agreement and demanded the baby back.
"The couple were very angry but they went ahead with the adoption.
"Legally, Paul and I could have taken the baby back, but we had already decided we don't want any more children and it would not have been fair on the couple."
There have also been accusations that she is motivated by greed and that she has made in the region of £50,000.
But she insists there is little left after expenses for maternity clothes, food, travel and vitamins.
She points out that the sum is hardly a huge amount considering she has been almost continually pregnant for the past 12 years.
After the problems following her last pregnancy, Miss Horlock might have considered giving up surrogacy.
But she did not want her "rent-a-womb" career to end on a sour note and agreed to have a baby for a Greek couple in their thirties, who are both teachers.
The wife had a hysterectomy two years ago following cancer.
She can still produce eggs but she cannot carry a baby.
Miss Horlock became pregnant using embryos created from the woman's eggs and her husband's sperm after having IVF in Greece.
It is the first time she has used IVF to become pregnant.
The news that she is carrying triplets came as a shock and she is bracing herself for her most difficult pregnancy yet.
She said: "I had twins about ten years ago and that was quite difficult. I'm expecting these three to be a bit of a challenge."
She said the Greek couple were "a little taken aback" when she told them she was carrying triplets, but were delighted nonetheless.
She added: "Not long ago they thought they would never have children at all.
"Now they're having three so they see it as a triple blessing.
"They knew that IVF always carries a high chance of multiple births so it wasn't a complete shock.
"It'll be hard work for them but they will cherish them all.'
Miss Horlock said this pregnancy could finally be the last.
"There's a strong possibility I will have a caesarean birth and that would take 18 months to recover from, by which time I will be almost 44," she said.
"I will have to see how I feel."
Miss Horlock, from Stevenage, Hertfordshire, moved to a fourbedroom farmhouse near Bordeaux, France, two years ago.
She has two children of her own, Steffanie, 16, from her first marriage, and 13-year-old Megan from a subsequent relationship.
Her present partner also has a child from a previous relationship.
Her first surrogate baby, a boy, was born in December 1995, followed by five girls including twins.
A second boy was born in January 2002, followed by a girl in April 2003 and a third boy in June 2004.
She remains good friends with two of the couples and often visits them and their children, who know she is their surrogate mother.
Most of the other parents send a photo of the child with a letter once a year.
"When I see the children, I don't think they are my babies, it is like seeing a friend's children," she said.
"I have never had a problem handing the babies over. I don't see them as my babies and I don't get emotionally attached to them during the pregnancy."
Surrogacy is still a controversial issue in Britain, especially as surrogate mothers are routinely paid "pregnancy expenses" by the couples they carry children for.
Actual payment is illegal, but it is not unusual for surrogates to make more than £10,000 a time.
Miss Horlock admits she could make a lot of money if she had babies for wealthy couples, but she says all the parents she has helped have been "ordinary couples".
"I do it to help people - and they pay me what they can afford," she said.
"I'm not a martyr, though.
"What people forget is that, emotionally, I get a lot out of this too.
"Surrogacy has made me a much more confident and fulfilled person."
j.mills@dailymail.co.uk
Dr Abdul Rahaman Obeid, director of the Bahrain-based Arab Centre for Nutrition, said obesity prevalance in the Gulf region ranged between 10 to 15 per cent among children in primary schools, 15 to 30 per cent in students at the intermediate level and 20 to 40 per cent in students at the secondary level. He said the statistics were from a recent report of the World Health Organisation (WHO). "Obesity in married women reached levels as high as 50 to 75 per cent due to recurrent pregnancy," he said.
