Ethical Surrogates

There is controversy surrounding the concept of surrogacy in the United States. There is nothing in federal legislature the addresses the issue directly. Different States have different laws concerning surrogacy. Some forbid it and some enforce surrogacy contracts in court. Finding a surrogate mother, for some is their last chance to have a child that is biologically their own. There are people that believe that surrogacy is morally wrong for several reasons. I believe that if it is done properly then it can be a blessing for a family that would not have been able to have their own children, otherwise.

Why the law is contradictory and ineffective when it comes to overseas surrogacy- Altruistic surrogacy is diversely regulated by the states and territories, raising the issue of the interaction of those laws in international cases. Commercial surrogacy is prohibited in Australia, but is permitted in other countries. An increasing number of Australians exploit this difference by entering into commercial surrogacy agreements overseas, raising the question of the effect of such agreements in Australia. Suggesting that the well-meaning regulation of altruistic surrogacy and criminalisation of commercial surrogacy within Australia is likely to be ineffective in cross-border situations. Accordingly, suggests to reform the Australian law and endorses

Baby Business by Insight on SBS had a discussion about surrogacy in relation to a couple that had a baby though surrogacy. In the show it was said that most surrogate mothers have genetically babies, which the mother gives her egg and the father gives his sperm and the doctor inseminates it in the surrogate mother. Most of the everyday people have to the term “renting a womb” towards surrogacy whereas the Women Health Resources

When one or more persons contract with a woman to gestate a child than relinquish that child after birth to the person or couple is known as surrogacy. It is a course of action that goes outside of natural reproduction. For some, it is the only method of having children, extending family. Surrogacy has been stirring up many controversies over the years. Ethics, morals, laws, religious views, etc. have played a major role in the issues that follow the topic of surrogacy. Laws and regulations pertaining to surrogacy vary from state to state. Some states have no enforceable laws

In their article “Cutting Motherhood in Two: Some Suspicions Concerning Surrogacy”, Hilde Lindemann Nelson and James Lindemann Nelson argue against the idea of commercial surrogacy. Their main argument revolves around the rights that biological parents owe to the children they bring into the world. This argument can be formulated as follows: 1) Bringing a child into the world makes a child vulnerable to harm, 2) Both of a child’s biological parents have duties and obligations to defend the child from harm, 3) Only biological parents can fulfill the duties to defend the child from harm and it is immoral for a parent not to do so, 4) Surrogate motherhood contracts require the biological mother to give up her parental rights, 5) Giving up parental rights prevents the biological mother from fulfilling her duties to the child, Therefore, 6) Surrogate motherhood contracts are immoral because the duties to the child are not met. This argument is, as any good argument must be, logically valid. It is impossible to disagree with the conclusion if the premises are true. However, this argument is unsound because not all of the premises are true. Biological parents are not the only people who can fulfill the duties owed to a child and protect them from harm. Surrogate motherhood contracts do not prevent the duties owed to the child from being met.

This change in law achieves justice for most same-sex couples, though there still are some couples who are negatively affected by this changing issue. The issue of shared parental responsibility is another issue that provides difficulty in achieving justice for the family law. There is a belief that equal shared parental responsibility is in the best interest of the child although this may not always be the case. An example of not achieving justice in this area is if a divorcing mother claims that her ex-husband is abusive and her husband should not gain any sort of custody of her children; if the mother does not have any evidence to back this up, her abusive ex-partner may gain custody of their children and the mother doesn’t. This in itself is a huge injustice for the mother and her children. The contemporary issue of surrogacy and birth technologies has been a long and argumentative topic. Some people may argue that a woman bearing a child for another couple is a sacrifice of their body, while others view it as an unethical and damaging process for the child; saying that the child is denied their birth parents. The laws relating to surrogacy differ in many countries but most countries agree on commercial surrogacy, saying that it be illegal for a woman to be paid to give birth to someone else’s child. The responsibility of the care and protection of children lies with the child’s parents. The decisions regarding children may include the child’s health, schooling, cultural upbringing and many other factors. The protection of the children becomes a problem when the parents of the children may not be able to provide adequate care and protection for their children, which is when the law will start to intervene in various

In Canada, 1 in 6 people will experience infertility where they have trouble conceiving (Fertilitymatters.ca, 2015). Unfortunately, Canada currently does not have reliable statistics on surrogate pregnancy (Lozanski, 2015). Presently, over 4.5 million children have been born through assisted reproductive technologies and this number is increasing each year (Golombok, Blake, Casey, Roman & Jadva, 2013). Even though surrogacy is legal in Canada, surrogates are prohibited from making profit through surrogacy (Surrogacy in Canada Online [SCO], 2015). The Assisted Human Reproduction Act was passed in 2004 where it outlines a surrogate may only be reimbursed for out of pocket expenses including maternity wear (SCO, 2015). Some of the things that

Adversaries of surrogacy see these risks and different issues as destructive to people, families and social orders and they feel that eventually legitimizing the practice would bring about an absence of admiration for the sacredness of life (Parliament of Canada, 2006). Society’s perspective will immediately be altered and surrogacy and surrogate mothers will become the topic of focus and be exposed to a whirlwind of controversy – controversy on that the procedure and technology isn’t the natural way of life. Surrogacy is an extremely exhausting procedure both physically and mentally for the women who put their body on the line. Dangers are like those that may be knowledgeable about every single other strategy for helped regenerative treatment (Better Health Gov., 2012). These dangers exceed the advantages and in view of alternating feelings and dispositions towards the embryo amid development, it is impractical for a pregnant lady to give genuinely educated agree to surrender a new born child until after conception has happened because of these safety welfares (Callahan,

The case of Baby M and the New Jersey Supreme Court’s ruling has caused discussions about surrogacy and surrogacy laws to halt. Any laws regarding surrogacy is implemented at the state level; there is no federal law about surrogacy. With no regulation of surrogates and surrogacy clinics, people are likely to use people they find themselves. This could leave people in debt, without the child they hoped for, or with a record that states they tried to buy a

Simply, surrogacy involves an agreement between a commissioning couple and a woman, known as the surrogate, who agrees to bear a child for the commissioning couple, and once the baby is born, will give the baby to the commissioning couple. Often this involves the use of sperm and/or ova from the commissioning couple which are conceived to the surrogate using birth technologies. The act of commercial surrogacy is illegal in Australia, however in certain states and the Northern Territory it is still legal to travel overseas to seek out such services commercially. The Australian couple the article focuses on is a prime example of this as they travelled to New Delhi in India to seek out such a surrogacy service.

Surrogacy, by definition, is the practice by which a woman (called a surrogate mother) becomes pregnant and gives birth to a baby in order to give it to someone who cannot have children (3). There are two types of surrogacy, gestational and traditional. The first is one where the resulting child is genetically unrelated to the surrogate mother. The second form, traditional, is when the surrogate mother is impregnated, whether the method is naturally or artificially, but the child is related to the surrogate given that the surrogate is the biological mother. In the case of Satz’s argument, the

In this video, I learned many things about surrogacy and donor parents. When a woman is trying to have a baby but fails to succeed, she often turns to alternative ways. One of the first things she may try is artificial insemination or IFV. Both of these treatments are ways to conceive a child and carry it in your own womb. There are many times that women want to have their own biological child, but it will not work. The next for women in this situation is surrogacy. Surrogacy is when another women carries a child and then gives it to the women to raise as her own. This often has many problems because either the surrogate mother wants to keep the child or the other mother decides she does not want to have a baby anymore.

An issue that I found interesting this week was commercial surrogacy that we read in chapter 7 Gender & Family: The Restructuring of Social Relationships. I found commercial surrogacy not only interesting but shocking because I had heard about it in movies and on TV but I did not know there were clinics that had surrogate mothers. Commercial surrogacy is when a surrogate mother is compensated for her service in addition to the medical expenses. In the article Childbirth at the Global Crossroads, the author Arlie Russell Hochschild mentions the Akanksha clinic connects clients from rich countries to surrogate mothers. One of the quotes that grabbed my attention was “ Even if the law were written to protect surrogates and then actually enforced, it would do nothing to address the crushing poverty that often presses Indian women to “choose” surrogacy in the first place.” I find this shocking because women's only solution to escape poverty is through surrogacy. I wonder if there are any medical complications and if the baby dies, will the surrogate mother still get paid for her services?

Some view altruistic surrogacy as a form of exploiting the surrogate. There is no monetary compensation to woman placing her health and well-being on the line for another’s benefit. However, it can also be held that the woman knowingly entered into the agreement with full disclosure of the risks and benefits to her health and body. Again, autonomy and justice are extremely prevalent ethical principles to explore when discussing the topic of surrogacy. Same-sex marriage has become a hot topic in the United States in the last few years. The idea of raising a family by homosexual

Surrogate Motherhood is something that not many people actually support, even though it “is one of the many reproductive techniques that have enabled infertile couples to have children” (qtd. in Freedman). There are two types of surrogacy, traditional and gestational. The traditional type of surrogacy involves the surrogate mother being (AI) artificially inseminated with the sperm of the intended father or sperm from a donor when the sperm count is low. In either case the surrogate’s own egg will be used. Genetically the surrogate becomes the mother of the resulting child (Storey). Although there are two different types of surrogacy, a traditional surrogacy is rarely seen or done anymore. In gestational surrogacy, the surrogate mother has