Technology helps Indians choose baby's sex

New reproductive technologies are tipping the sex balance of babies born in India further in favour of boys, an international conference has heard.

This is despite efforts to stem the growing use of technologies like pre-implantation diagnosis that have already weeded out millions of girls from the birth statistics.

And the proportion of girls may drop even further with plans to stabilise India's population over the next 10 to 15 years, say some observers.

The World Bioethics Congress in Sydney this week heard that despite laws limiting the use of prenatal and preconception technologies to diagnosing disease, such technologies were still being used to favour baby boys.

And at last count the ratio of girls to boys was still falling.

Dr Vasantha Muthuswamy, senior deputy director general of the Indian Council of Medical Research in New Delhi, said the 2001 census reported there were 927 girls for every 1000 boys. This compares with 976 girls for every 1000 boys in 1961.

She said this was a long-term problem. But in the past 20 years there had been a sharp decline...