Transparency is the Victim

Expansion and proliferation of assisted reproductive technologies (ART) has been facilitated by economic globalisation wherein reproductive tissues like sperm, ova, and uteri are traded like any other commodity to make profit, says a new study, adding that India has emerged as the surrogacy outsourcing capital of the world.

Titled ‘Reproductive Tourism in India: Actors, Agencies and Contemporary Transnational Networks’, the study was conducted by the Centre of Social Medicine and Community Health, JNU, Sama-Resource Group for Women and Health and King’s College London.

The study focuses on the scenario in New Delhi where a large number of private hospitals and government institutions offer ART. It was found that public sector institutions offer only altruistic surrogacy services which are medically indicated. Leading obstetricians and gynaecologists from a top government-run hospital admitted that they have performed in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) in some cases where they were not sure if it was altruistic surrogacy.

One doctor said that she once had a patient, a doctor by profession who bore a surrogate baby for her sister-in-law who was also a doctor, married to a doctor...