Friday, August 26, 2016

Should babies be a commodity for profits?

The government is to pass a bill banning commercial surrogacy. The bill will allow 'altruistic surrogacy', in which a 'close relative' will be allowed to carry the child of a couple who have been married for at least 5 years and have not been able to produce any children. The surrogate mother must also be a married woman with a child of her own. Presumably because the first pregnancy is the most difficult and prolonged, subsequent deliveries being shorter and less painful for the mother. Commercial surrogacy is a $1 billion dollar business, so naturally there are howls of protest from those who will see a precipitous fall in profits, mainly doctors and middlemen. Women's rights groups say that it will drive the business underground which will increase risks for surrogate mothers who are poor women. True, but with stringent punishment for doctors the numbers will be extremely small. Anyway, a woman giving birth to a white child will be immediately obvious and trying to procure a passport or travel permit for the child will become impossible. So foreign parents will not be able to take the child home. It maybe possible to impregnate a woman in India and then take her to Nepal for delivery but that will increase costs and the doctor will be easy to trace. The government says that it is only a money making racket, exploiting poverty. What about a woman's right over her own body? If that is the case then should a poor woman be allowed to sell her kidney to a rich man? There is no dearth of people ready to donate a kidney for cash as a recent scandal at a well known hospital has shown. If a man says," I am dying of hunger. Isn't it better that I survive longer by selling one kidney. It is not as if I will die with one kidney. Anyway it is my body." Will that argument be acceptable? If a woman rents out her vagina for money she is called a prostitute, which is unacceptable, but if she rents out her uterus then she is a surrogate, so that is alright. Some viruses like Ebola and Zika can last in sperms for 6 months. What if the biological parents refuse to accept a baby born with microcephaly, like a baby with Down's syndrome born to a Thai woman was refused by an Australian couple. Ebola is a deadly virus and an outbreak in India, with its population concentration, will kill tens of millions. Adults have the right to have as many children as they want, regardless of whether they can feed, clothe or educate them. But children have no rights. Because they do not vote. Any suggestion of controlling childbirth is condemned as eugenics. Children cannot become a commodity to be bought and sold. That surely is worse than eugenics.

No comments: