The New World of International Surrogacy

[totoro]

I was surprised to learn that in the past ten years it appears that international surrogacy, starting in India, has created a whole world of possibilities for those who are infertile or are older when they start families.  Or, I suppose, women that want to retire before having children and plan ahead by freezing eggs...

For less than the cost of a new car ($30,000) it is now possible to have another woman carry your child in India or Thailand.   And the success rate of this method appears to vary from 45% using your own eggs, to 60-70% using an egg donor.

In some countries sex selection is permitted and genetic testing is available.

If this option is not regulated out of existence, my guess is that it will become much more popular in coming years.  I hadn't realized it even existed.

http://www.newlifethailand.net/Financial

[Daleth]

I was surprised to learn that in the past ten years it appears that international surrogacy, starting in India, has created a whole world of possibilities for those who are infertile or are older when they start families.  Or, I suppose, women that want to retire before having children and plan ahead by freezing eggs...

It's interesting stuff, but just for clarity, surrogacy is not for those who are "older when they start families" or who freeze their eggs when young. (I'm using the present tense there, instead of "women who froze their eggs," because reliable egg-freezing technology is so new that there are no middle-aged women today who are able to get pregnant with eggs frozen when they were fertile.... They can get pregnant with embryos made and frozen when they were younger, because embryo freezing is a much older technology, like back to the 80s... but that's a completely different story.)

Surrogacy is a solution when your womb is absent or malformed or otherwise not functional. That can happen at any age and is no more likely to happen when you're, say, 43 than when you're 23. Surrogacy is also a solution when there is some other medical reason that you should not carry a child. For instance, if you absolutely have to take medication that is dangerous for a fetus, or if you had a hormone-sensitive cancer and being exposed to the extra estrogen of pregnancy could bring it back, or if you had a nearly fatal complication in a previous pregnancy and your doctor warned that it would likely happen again if you got pregnant again.

In contrast to womb problems and other medical reasons you can't be pregnant, the other common problem (way more common) is having egg problems. All women start having egg problems as they get older, but many women start having egg problems when they're younger (very occasionally you'll even see women who went into menopause at 18 or 20) or have eggs that were damaged or destroyed by cancer treatment. Surrogacy doesn't help them; what they need is egg donation. AFAIK the oldest woman who gave birth to a child through egg donation was 63; most clinics won't do it over age 51 or so, but the point is, if your eggs are bad, that has absolutely nothing to do with whether you can carry a pregnancy. You can carry it as long as you get a good egg from someone.

So long story short...
- Womb problems or medical reasons not to be pregnant can hit at any age, and surrogacy is a solution to that.
- Egg problems hit all women as they age, and sometimes also strike younger women. Either way, egg donation is a solution.

THAT BEING SAID, many American women travel to Europe, South Africa or occasionally (for Indian-American women) India, for donor eggs. In the US donor-egg treatment costs anywhere from $25k-$60k, but in Europe it's under $8000 and in South Africa it's about $10,000. The main countries people travel to are the Czech Republic and Spain, but it's also available in Greece and Cyprus. Like surrogacy--and indeed, more so than surrogacy--this is a big and growing sector of medical tourism.

Europe has world-class clinics that cater to foreign women because in several European countries egg donation is illegal (all the German-speaking countries, plus Italy and I think Ireland) and in several others it is regulated in a weird way that makes the waiting list years long (the UK, France...), whereas you could get pregnant six weeks from now if you pop over to Spain or the Czech Republic. South Africa also has great clinics, partly because it's basically the only developed nation in the area, and partly because Australia and New Zealand have very long waitlists for egg donation, so women from those countries need a Southern Hemisphere destination that can serve them. I have heard of American women going there too. Some people also travel to the Caribbean and Central America but their clinics don't have the reputation of the European ones.

For less than the cost of a new car ($30,000) it is now possible to have another woman carry your child in India or Thailand.   And the success rate of this method appears to vary from 45% using your own eggs, to 60-70% using an egg donor.

Those donor egg stats sound accurate, but unless you're under 35, 45% would be an extraordinarily--indeed, suspiciously--high success rate for using your own eggs. For proof, go here and click on "SART National Data Summary"--you'll see the success rates, stratified by the woman's age, of IVF in the US (where our clinics are on average much better than Indian clinics): http://www.sart.org/find_frm.html
On average in the US, in women under 35, the chances of having a baby through IVF with your own eggs is 40.1%. It drops to 31.9% for women 35-37 and 21.6% for women 38-40.

Apart from ethical concerns with Indian surrogates, and the expense of traveling there multiple times (husband has to travel to provide the sperm sample, parents have to go to get the baby...), there is a potentially serious legal problem with using surrogates outside the US. Long story short, if you want to bring your baby home to the US, the sperm and/or the eggs MUST come from a US-citizen parent. If you're American, your husband isn't, and you use an egg donor, your baby is not a US citizen and you can't bring it home. If neither of you are American citizens and you use your own sperm and eggs, same problem.

This isn't a merely theoretical risk; the US State Department requires parents who use foreign surrogates to undergo DNA tests after the child's birth to prove that at least one American-citizen parent is genetically related to the child. This requires at least one of you to stay in India (or wherever) for however long it takes for DNA results to come back and then for the State Dept. wheels to turn to get you an American passport for the baby. That can get expensive. Also, even if you're using the eggs/sperm that should result in a US citizen baby, you'd better hope the IVF clinic doesn't make a mistake (very rare, but not nearly as extraordinarily rare as it is in the US). If you end up with a baby who is not a US citizen, you cannot bring them home... you could if you could adopt them, but because under Indian law you (the mother of a baby born to a surrogate) are already the legal mother, adoption is not legally possible.

[totoro]

Yes, you obviously know a lot more about this than I do.  I haven't been following the technology. 

According to the websites they will harvest and store eggs for a period of five years at these clinics.  This would mean that someone who is currently thirty could save thirty-year-old eggs to thirty-five.  I'm not saying this is the way to go, only that it is available and it changes the options from when I had kids (starting 15 years ago).

Had these choices been available to me affordably I might have done something like this.  I suspect other long-term planners might as well.

The website also caters to same-sex couples, gay singles, older singles, second marriage folk and HIV positive people not wanting to expose the child.

[Daleth]

I haven't heard of any time limit on storing frozen eggs. Huh. I wonder why that would be. Babies have been born from sperm frozen 20 years earlier and from embryos frozen a decade or more earlier.

Egg freezing is not what anyone would call affordable, though, at least not in the US. It's easily $12k-$15k per cycle. The only scenario in which I can imagine an insurance company possibly paying for it is if a woman were about to get chemo and wanted to save eggs so that when she got better and eventually met someone, she could still have babies.

Speaking of alternative family structures, as you did at the end of your post, the Czech Republic is not an option for gay couples or single women, because Czech law doesn't permit egg donation or other fertility procedures to be provided to anyone but straight, married people. Spain has no such restrictions; they will serve all comers. I don't know about Greece or South Africa--not something I've looked into.

[meadow lark]

I would worry about the ethics of this.  I have no issue with surrogacy, but slavery, especially of women, still happens in many countries, including India.  I would have to be utterly convinced the women doing this were consenting, and that they were being compensated. 

[totoro]

Yes, that is a good point.  You can meet the surrogates. They are typically earning about 10x what they could otherwise earn annually if the reports as accurate.  I'm not sure how much oversight there is.

[Argyle]

There are also men who go for surrogacy without a mother involved.  I mean they use donor eggs and then hire an unrelated surrogate.  I know of one case first-hand. 

The women in these third-world countries certainly usually get many times the average yearly income, but if it becomes too prevalent, you can bet someone will be in on it trying to hire out women and take the money for themselves. 

[Daleth]

I would worry about the ethics of this.  I have no issue with surrogacy, but slavery, especially of women, still happens in many countries, including India.  I would have to be utterly convinced the women doing this were consenting, and that they were being compensated.

It's a lot easier to make sure of that if you do surrogacy in one of the US states where it's legal (i.e. where there are actually laws about it and those laws permit the result you want, namely that the surrogate is not considered the legal mother of the child).

But of course it's way more expensive here, on the order of $60k+ including both the surrogacy and the cost of the IVF portion of it. If you've already got frozen embryos--for instance if you did IVF with your own or donor eggs, and then doctors determined that you couldn't safely carry a pregnancy to term--of course it's much cheaper.

[Landlord2015]

I am pro for this idea. As usual banned strictly in Sweden my neighbor country lol. Finland where I live have HUGELY different laws then Sweden. Outwards Sweden and Finland appear same and similar tax system but there are many laws that are very different.

Interesting BANNED in Germany despite that in some aspects Germany and Finland laws are more close to each other then Sweden is to Finland.

[Daleth]

I am pro for this idea. As usual banned strictly in Sweden my neighbor country lol. Finland where I live have HUGELY different laws then Sweden. Outwards Sweden and Finland appear same and similar tax system but there are many laws that are very different.

Interesting BANNED in Germany despite that in some aspects Germany and Finland laws are more close to each other then Sweden is to Finland.

Even freezing embryos is banned in Germany, if I'm not mistaken. Which means that it's impossible to do effective IVF in Germany, so many couples go to Austria or the Czech Republic to do IVF. You need to be able to freeze embryos to do IVF effectively because most eggs and most embryos don't become babies (i.e. you usually need to transfer several embryos into the woman's womb in order to get one baby), but it's obviously unsafe to transfer a bunch of embryos at once because there's always the risk that more than one of them will "stick," and even twin pregnancies--much less triplet, quad, etc.--are much higher risk for mom and babies than singleton pregnancies. So to be able to SAFELY transfer several embryos and hopefully end up with one baby, you need to be able to freeze some of the embryos you make for later attempts. But in Germany, you can't.

[franklin w. dixon]

While I'm at it, maybe they'll also sell me one of their kidneys and an eye. I've always wanted a novelty human eyeball, and it's not like they don't have a second one. Plus with the high premium for exotic eyeballs I'll be doing them a favor!!

[franklin w. dixon]

There are also men who go for surrogacy without a mother involved.  I mean they use donor eggs and then hire an unrelated surrogate.  I know of one case first-hand. 

The women in these third-world countries certainly usually get many times the average yearly income, but if it becomes too prevalent, you can bet someone will be in on it trying to hire out women and take the money for themselves.

Remember all the countries that have cut off the tap to rich shitheads swooping in and adoptin the hot fuck out of every infant in sight?

Remember how they did that because a bunch of the babies were stolen or otherwise trafficked?

Whoopsy doodle!

[franklin w. dixon]

At least the people who adopt children from poor countries have a morality tale that they can use in their own heads to be like "I'm a good person."

The people who stomp over to poor countries and hire surrogates because they're too cheap to do it in a place with legal protections and established medical institutions? All the while hollering #yolo? Yeah, fuck 'em.

"Baby Gammy might mean the end of Thailand's lucrative surrogacy business.

He's the child who was carried by a surrogate mom in Thailand— and rejected by the Australian couple who had agreed to pay the mother $12,000. The reason: Prenatal testing showed that the baby, a twin, had Down syndrome." http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2014/10/22/357870757/surrogacy-storm-in-thailand-a-rejected-baby-a-busy-babymaker

Good business, nice folks, all around a great idea for everybody. Just kidding of course. What I mean is: fuck them, and fuck stranger surrogacy altogether for that matter.

[gaja]

Baby Gammy is a horrible story, and it is of course impossible to know if the media is telling the truth, but it is well dokumented that the father is a convicted sex offender who has molested several little girls.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/05/gammy-father-child-abuse-convictions-investigation

[chouchouu]

Surrogacy in India is unethical IMO. The clinics there have certain requirements of the woman, namely that they make them sign contracts agreeing that they will not leave the premises for the duration of the pregnancy. It also requires the woman to have had previous successful pregnancies, ie a family. This is so that the clinic can guarantee the woman will not run away with the child. So the surrogate is basically under house arrest and only able to see her family under scheduled meeting times, if they actually have the means to see them in the first place. It's a completely dehumanising experience.

[lostamonkey]

I don't personally have any moral issues with this. The $20K that a woman in a developing country will be paid will help her family a lot more than the $60K paid to a surrogate in North America. And I don't have a problem with the clinics setting strict rules for the surrogates. They agreed to a job so they have to abide by their employer's rules. It's a short term sacrifice for a long term reward. Personally, I would go to jail for six month if they paid me enough money to FIRE immediately when I got out. If we are morally okay with our clothes being produced in a sweatshop in the developing world, then this should also be fine.

[Daleth]

Surrogacy in India is unethical IMO. .... It also requires the woman to have had previous successful pregnancies, ie a family. This is so that the clinic can guarantee the woman will not run away with the child.

That's actually not why. All reputable, ethical surrogacy agencies worldwide require that to be a surrogate, you must have had at least one successful, complication-free pregnancy and birth, and no medically complicated pregnancies or births. Why? Because having that as your medical history means you are at a greatly reduced risk of running into complications this time around (when you act as a surrogate). No ethical surrogacy agency wants to put the surrogates or the babies at risk.

[franklin w. dixon]

I don't personally have any moral issues with this. The $20K that a woman in a developing country will be paid will help her family a lot more than the $60K paid to a surrogate in North America. And I don't have a problem with the clinics setting strict rules for the surrogates. They agreed to a job so they have to abide by their employer's rules. It's a short term sacrifice for a long term reward. Personally, I would go to jail for six month if they paid me enough money to FIRE immediately when I got out. If we are morally okay with our clothes being produced in a sweatshop in the developing world, then this should also be fine.

lol, what the heck

"There is no such thing as ethical consumption under capitalism, ergo, everything is fine." This is like seeing Fermat's last theorem proved right before my eyes!

[chouchouu]

Surrogacy in India is unethical IMO. .... It also requires the woman to have had previous successful pregnancies, ie a family. This is so that the clinic can guarantee the woman will not run away with the child.

That's actually not why. All reputable, ethical surrogacy agencies worldwide require that to be a surrogate, you must have had at least one successful, complication-free pregnancy and birth, and no medically complicated pregnancies or births. Why? Because having that as your medical history means you are at a greatly reduced risk of running into complications this time around (when you act as a surrogate). No ethical surrogacy agency wants to put the surrogates or the babies at risk.

My issue isn't the previous pregnancies, I'm well aware that it is standard practise. It's the keeping women under house arrest away from her family that I take issue with. I'm sure many of them have young children if they are of child bearing age, I just can't imagine being away from my children for so long and hardly being able to see them. Not to mention being trapped somewhere for so long, it's dehumanising.

[dude]

I guess I'll just never understand some peoples' overarching need/compulsion to have kids.

[Daleth]

I guess I'll just never understand some peoples' overarching need/compulsion to have kids.

That's totally fine, as long as you don't pass judgment on them for having a fairly normal and not unhealthy need/compulsion that you just happen not to share.

[totoro]

I've got no problem with surrogacy, international or domestic, if people are doing it voluntarily and there are adequate rules in place.  I don't think Thailand has adequate rules, although this is changing.   India's rules seem okay for surrogate safety but not for some other aspects. 

Agreeing to be a surrogate and live away from home without cost for the pregnancy is different than being forced to do so or being under "house arrest".

Here is what one surrogate in India had to say about it:

"A single mother, she was faced with financial difficulties and she first agreed to be a surrogate to pay for the education of her two sons. “I can’t earn this kind of money in a regular job,” she says. “I am educated and I know what this involves. This has helped me build a house and pay for the future of my two sons. I plan to do this again and again to earn as much as I can for my family.”

http://www.iaac.ca/en/commercial-surrogacy-in-india-exploitation-or-mutual-assistance-4

If I had a chance to earn 10X what I would otherwise earn and it would pay for my kids to have a better life and I had limited opportunities I would have considered it.  Not to mention the helping part of it which appeals to me as well. 

Heck, if this was an option in Canada and you could earn 10X a lower salary as a result, say $300,000, from it you can bet people would be lined up to do it and there would be loads of MMM early retired surrogates who would be feeling pretty good about their job.

As far as not wanting kids, so don't have them.  Make your own choices on this.  For me, having kids has been unexpectedly great. 

[chouchouu]

I've got no problem with surrogacy, international or domestic, if people are doing it voluntarily and there are adequate rules in place.  I don't think Thailand has adequate rules, although this is changing.   India's rules seem okay for surrogate safety but not for some other aspects. 

Agreeing to be a surrogate and live away from home without cost for the pregnancy is different than being forced to do so or being under "house arrest".

Here is what one surrogate in India had to say about it:

"A single mother, she was faced with financial difficulties and she first agreed to be a surrogate to pay for the education of her two sons. “I can’t earn this kind of money in a regular job,” she says. “I am educated and I know what this involves. This has helped me build a house and pay for the future of my two sons. I plan to do this again and again to earn as much as I can for my family.”

http://www.iaac.ca/en/commercial-surrogacy-in-india-exploitation-or-mutual-assistance-4

If I had a chance to earn 10X what I would otherwise earn and it would pay for my kids to have a better life and I had limited opportunities I would have considered it.  Not to mention the helping part of it which appeals to me as well. 

Heck, if this was an option in Canada and you could earn 10X a lower salary as a result, say $300,000, from it you can bet people would be lined up to do it and there would be loads of MMM early retired surrogates who would be feeling pretty good about their job.

As far as not wanting kids, so don't have them.  Make your own choices on this.  For me, having kids has been unexpectedly great.

The article doesn't place indian surrogacy in a favourable light, several women confided they had been coerced into surrogacy by their husbands! Clearly there wasn't thorough screening of these women and considering they were interviewed at the surrogacy clinic I imagine you would have many more confide if they actually were in neutral territory.

The fact is you can't own a person. No matter how much heartbreak an infertile couple goes through doesn't make it right to keep a woman from her family to create your own. Doesn't matter if a woman signs a contract, she should have bodily autonomy. Which means she should be able to leave the premises of the surrogacy clinic if she so wishes and has changed her mind. A surrogate is not a slave, she's a human being with just as much rights as the people she is surrogate for.

[deborah]

South Africa also has great clinics, partly because it's basically the only developed nation in the area, and partly because Australia and New Zealand have very long waitlists for egg donation, so women from those countries need a Southern Hemisphere destination that can serve them.

I had never heard of anyone from Australia going to South Africa (of all places) for surrogacy. It is further than India or Thailand, which are cheaper. Why would we need to go somewhere in the Southern Hemisphere? So I looked.

https://aifs.gov.au/publications/families-policy-and-law/8-use-surrogacy-australians-implications-policy-and-law-reform
is an Australian Government site about surrogacy, and in it they say that 80% of non-domestic Australian surrogacies are in India. 14% are in the US, and 6% are in other places in the world, so the vast majority of our overseas surrogacies are Indian, and very few are South African. We don't pay for some things that people in the US might expect to pay for. Paying for people to be surrogates is illegal (because of the temptation for human trafficking).

Gammy was an extraordinarily public case. Twins were born and one was accepted by the Australian parents, while the other wasn't. Gammy ended up getting crowdfunded because people were appalled at the story. As a result of this case, the Australian law has become more convoluted for people attempting to have overseas surrogacy.

[dude]

I guess I'll just never understand some peoples' overarching need/compulsion to have kids.

That's totally fine, as long as you don't pass judgment on them for having a fairly normal and not unhealthy need/compulsion that you just happen not to share.

I think many people cross the "not unhealthy" line in their quest for kids -- I've read a number of stories where people pretty well bankrupted themselves to have in vitro/adopt/surrogate.  That doesn't seem normal or healthy to me.

Here's one example:

http://business.financialpost.com/personal-finance/family-finance/fertility-treatments-leave-couple-with-huge-debt

[MEJG]

I'm a person who has experienced five unexplained pregnancy losses, has carried 1 pregnancy successfully, has adopted internationally, and has weighed options pretty rigorously. 

I've spoken to adult adoptees; I am well read about most of the issues surrounding infertility, adoption (domestic, foster care, international, embryo), infertility treatment options, transracial adoption etc.

I think there are huge ethical issues with surogacy and at this point do not think regulation is really possible in many places.  I do think pregnancies through gestational surrogates *can* be ethical.  I feel strongly for those who do not have healthy gametes, but really think buying eggs and sperm is fraught with ethical issues.

In my opinion when we talk about these issues the focus should be on the child - not on the parents.  If you frame all your ethical questioning around what is best for the child in question it really clarifies a lot for me.

[Daleth]

I guess I'll just never understand some peoples' overarching need/compulsion to have kids.

That's totally fine, as long as you don't pass judgment on them for having a fairly normal and not unhealthy need/compulsion that you just happen not to share.

I think many people cross the "not unhealthy" line in their quest for kids -- I've read a number of stories where people pretty well bankrupted themselves to have in vitro/adopt/surrogate.  That doesn't seem normal or healthy to me.

We are all on this forum not because we value money for its own sake, but because we value the lives that we can live as a result of handling money well.

If you deeply, deeply want to have children--if that's the life you want to live--then why WOULDN'T you throw all the money you could at it? I don't think anyone regrets spending a ton of money on that if at the end of the day they have a child as a result.

[Daleth]

I feel strongly for those who do not have healthy gametes, but really think buying eggs and sperm is fraught with ethical issues.

What issues?

In my opinion when we talk about these issues the focus should be on the child - not on the parents.  If you frame all your ethical questioning around what is best for the child in question it really clarifies a lot for me.

What if the options are "the child gets to be born and have a life" or "the child is never born at all" (because, for instance, egg donation is banned so there's no way for the couple to have a child, whereas they would have had one or more with egg donation)? I tend to think that getting to be born to and raised by loving parents is way the heck better for the child than not getting to be born at all.

[justajane]

Others have already touched on my concerns about international surrogacy and they are the same as international organ "donation", only in this case you are essentially under house arrest for 9 months. You can say all you want that these women do this of their own free will, but they are under economic duress. These are the same reasons that we don't allow organ donation for hire in this country - because it has the very real potential to exploit the most vulnerable in society.

And while with surrogacy you are not minus a kidney at the end, pregnancy has real health risks, especially when it is a surrogacy because of all the drugs used in the process. These can have lifelong effects for the women, especially if they do it more than once.

I highly recommend reading The Red Market: On the Trail of the World's Organ Brokers, Bone Thieves, Blood Farmers, and Child Traffickers by Scott Carney. He also discusses the exploitation of surrogacy and international egg donorship.

[totoro]

Yes, there is the potential for exploitation with international surrogacy.  There is the potential for exploitation with anything requiring the labour of others.

This is why there need to be rules but I don't think the rules should go so far as to prevent paying someone to be a surrogate.   I think we should be allowed to do this to a reasonable maximum in Canada too.  The government disagrees.

The truth is there are all sorts of jobs we would not do if we were FI and the closer to the survival edge you are the more you would consider taking on work that is lower paying/less desirable/less healthy.

This forum is organized around freedom from paid work.  Paid work can be characterized as unethical in that the time and effort of fellow humans is being bought by those higher up on this ladder.  Freedom from this only extends to the freedom accumulated in the form of FU funds or training they have taken to get a "better" job.  And work needs rules too or workers can suffer from exploitation like we've seen in factories overseas producing clothing for the NA market.

So, back to surrogacy.  I see the risks associated with surrogacy vs. the reward in terms of 10x annual income as an option I would find potentially attractive.  And I've been poor.  I can see a husband and wife making this decision for the betterment of their own children's future.  Is it fair that some people would find this appealing and others with more money would not?  I don't know.  All I know is that there is inequality and the chance to step up to something better is one I've pursued throughout my life and it was well worth the effort in the end.

And there is no "house arrest" imo.  There is an agreement in advance.  What you are calling "economic duress" could also be characterized by a free will decision like going to Afghanistan as a computer engineer for the 3x salary and higher savings rate.  There is economic duress to the extent that someone who was FI might not make this potentially life-threatening choice, but then there are other choices to be made and no-one is forcing them to sign up. 

If you would like the world to be fair and equal without any economic differences I understand this desire, but the reality of it does not exist and the experiments with this style of society have failed miserably.   The motivation to accomplish and progress and make things better for our children specifically is a pretty strong human drive.

I think the real issue is regulation of conditions to preclude unacceptable unfairness in the transaction.  Reasonable precautions, good medical care and living conditions for surrogates with adequate remuneration (a 10x salary seems adequate), and criteria applied to the parents in the best interests of the children to be.  This requires government involvement and legislation imo.  The capitalist system is not good at self-regulating fairly where there is a strong economic incentive.

[Daleth]

Totoro, I could not have said it better myself. What a great post.

The crazy thing is, people on the web comment pretty often about how surrogacy and/or egg donation are "exploitative," shouldn't be allowed because there are amorphous unspecified health risks, etc. ...and at the same time, those people are happy to eat a tuna sandwich or go out for sushi even though being a fisherman is THE DEADLIEST job in America, with 200 deaths and 800 injuries per every 100,000 workers EVERY YEAR. And that's in America, where we have OSHA and other worker safety laws, so imagine how deadly it must be to catch that Brazilian tilapia or Korean sushi you had for lunch! I'm posting a few links below about just how deadly it is to be a fisherman. Oh, and American fisherman run this massive risk for a paltry $23k/year average annual salary.

So apparently it's ok for people to take a 1/500 risk of death EVERY YEAR so that you can have a tuna sandwich, and in exchange they get $23k/year... but it's not ok for a young woman to take an absolutely minuscule risk of possible future health problems in order to bring children into the world who would otherwise never exist, making infertile people parents... in exchange for $5000-$10,000 payment and just 3-4 weeks of her time? And not ok for a surrogate to earn $35k plus expenses (or in India, several times their annual salary) to be pregnant for 9 months?

Hmm. Call me crazy, but I can't help but think that this disparity in people's thinking is because people think it's totally fine to pass laws about women's genitals, but god forbid we should restrict the free market under which some people decide to become fishermen.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/adventure/outdoors/a6249/why-commercial-fishing-is-the-deadliest-job-in-america/

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/04/13/20-most-dangerous-jobs-from-fishermen-to-farmers.html (gallery of the deadliest jobs in America--fisherman is #1, with 200 deaths and 800 injuries per 100,000 workers each year).

http://adventure.howstuffworks.com/outdoor-activities/fishing/fish-conservation/responsible-fishing/alaska-fishing.htm

[MEJG]

I feel strongly for those who do not have healthy gametes, but really think buying eggs and sperm is fraught with ethical issues.

What issues?

In my opinion when we talk about these issues the focus should be on the child - not on the parents.  If you frame all your ethical questioning around what is best for the child in question it really clarifies a lot for me.

What if the options are "the child gets to be born and have a life" or "the child is never born at all" (because, for instance, egg donation is banned so there's no way for the couple to have a child, whereas they would have had one or more with egg donation)? I tend to think that getting to be born to and raised by loving parents is way the heck better for the child than not getting to be born at all.

This is a complex issue and my thoughts on it tend to meander, please bear with me.

IMO the ethical issues around gamete "donation" fall into two categories.  The first is the sales aspect.  One gets paid to donate eggs or sperm.  These are some of the only body parts/tissues (if you consider them that...) that one can be paid to donate.  It falls under sales in my mind.  So is it ok for us to sell our tissue?  We're not allowed (in this country, I'm located in the US) to be compensated for donating a kidney- why is it ok to be compensated for donating my eggs?  Especially since you are using them to create a child. 

The other area with ethical issues relates to the created children themselves.  There are countries right now looking at (maybe the already have?) opening up records from sperm banks for medical reasons etc.  After speaking to a number of adult adoptees it is pretty clear there are a large portion of adoptees that feel a huge void in not knowing their genetic family.  There are long term impacts for many (but certainly not all) people who have been raised by non-genetic parents.  The emotional issues are hard to fully weigh.    There are also very concrete medical reasons to know your genetic  background.  We know now some of the genetic basis with many of our medical issues, as we progress medically this will have an even bigger impact on health care.  When a child or adult does not have access to family history it makes medical care in developed nations significantly more difficult.

We've dealt with the medical aspect with our adoptive daughter repeatedly, and she will continue to face that through her life.  This applies to allergies, heart disease, cancer risk, mental health issues and how your doctors create a plan for disease screening later in life.

Further, there have been cases of half siblings dating without knowing due to sperm donation.  Popular sperm donors could have dozens to hundreds of children and there is no good way to track that so you don't end up marring or procreating with your 1/2 sibling.

Basically a child conceived of donated gametes is adrift of their genetic history and that has long term consequences  both emotionally and medically.

In terms of a child being born or not being born.  Well, eggs and sperm have no idea that they have a potential for life.  I am glad I WAS born, but if I hadn't been I would never have known what I was missing.  This plays into the abortion debate, which is not what we're discussing now.  I think that a child not being conceived is not unethical.

When we're discussing the ethics of having children, one should weigh in all the children out there that are already born that need families.  This all plays into adoption.  Paying for gametes and surogacy can range from "renting a womb" in the case of gestational surogates who are carrying the genetic child of the parents,  all the way to basically paying to adopt a child that you specifically created by picking who's gametes you use and who carries the child.   If one is paying other people for their gametes and to rent a womb why not adopt a child who is already in need of parents?

In a perfect world everyone that wanted children could conceive them easily, and all conceived would be wanted and well cared for by loving parents for their whole lives.  There would be no infertility and no adoption.  We don't live in that world at all.

[Daleth]

We're not allowed (in this country, I'm located in the US) to be compensated for donating a kidney- why is it ok to be compensated for donating my eggs?  Especially since you are using them to create a child.

Shouldn't we back up first, and remember why we're not allowed to sell kidneys? Namely, because there are serious risks to undergoing major surgery under general anesthesia (healthy people die on the operating table every year), and also the lifelong risk of being left with just one kidney? Not only is the human body designed to function best with two, having only one means you have no backup if that one is damaged or starts to fail.

None of those risks exist at all with sperm donation. As for egg donation, the second risk (going through the rest of your life without those eggs) is completely nonexistent, and the first risk (surgical procedure) is incredibly low because egg donation is not major surgery (it's a 20-minute outpatient procedure done with a needle, not a scalpel) and is not done with general anesthesia.

The other area with ethical issues relates to the created children themselves.  There are countries right now looking at (maybe the already have?) opening up records from sperm banks for medical reasons etc.  After speaking to a number of adult adoptees it is pretty clear there are a large portion of adoptees that feel a huge void in not knowing their genetic family.  There are long term impacts for many (but certainly not all) people who have been raised by non-genetic parents.  The emotional issues are hard to fully weigh.    There are also very concrete medical reasons to know your genetic  background.  We know now some of the genetic basis with many of our medical issues, as we progress medically this will have an even bigger impact on health care.  When a child or adult does not have access to family history it makes medical care in developed nations significantly more difficult.

You're making a basic assumption here: that egg and sperm donors are forever anonymous, untrackable, and no medical information is known about them.

Not the case.

And even if it were the case, wouldn't the solution be to fix those problems? Why ban it instead of simply changing the laws so those problems don't exist anymore?

When we're discussing the ethics of having children, one should weigh in all the children out there that are already born that need families.  This all plays into adoption.

Do you know why it typically takes years to adopt? Because there are far more people interested in adopting than there are children legally available for adoption. Also, please explain to me why people who are fertile have no duty to "weigh all the children out there that are already born that need families" before trying to get pregnant. Why is it only infertile people who get judged for not adopting?

Paying for gametes and surogacy can range from "renting a womb" in the case of gestational surogates...

And now a quick word from some gestational surrogates in India, so we can hear them speak for themselves rather than listening to Americans who have never met an Indian or a surrogate but still feel qualified to speak for them:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/03/india-surrogate-embryo-ban-hardship-gujarat-fertility-clinic

[former player]

Shouldn't we back up first, and remember why we're not allowed to sell kidneys? Namely, because there are serious risks to undergoing major surgery under general anesthesia (healthy people die on the operating table every year), and also the lifelong risk of being left with just one kidney? Not only is the human body designed to function best with two, having only one means you have no backup if that one is damaged or starts to fail.

None of those risks exist at all with sperm donation. As for egg donation, the second risk (going through the rest of your life without those eggs) is completely nonexistent, and the first risk (surgical procedure) is incredibly low because egg donation is not major surgery (it's a 20-minute outpatient procedure done with a needle, not a scalpel) and is not done with general anesthesia.

My understanding is that the main health risks of egg donation relate to the drugs necessary to stimulate the ovaries.  You correctly say that the surgery is minor and but completely omit mentioning that the main health risks, including future infertility, come from the drugs needed to stimulate the ovaries.  It is a shame, because up until reading this response I had been taking your comments as fair and balanced information.

You're making a basic assumption here: that egg and sperm donors are forever anonymous, untrackable, and no medical information is known about them.

Not the case.

And even if it were the case, wouldn't the solution be to fix those problems? Why ban it instead of simply changing the laws so those problems don't exist anymore?

Donor anonymity depends on the jurisdiction.  And even if the donor information is accessible, the child would have to know that they were donor-born, and there is no way to ensure that the parents bringing the child up pass this information on.

Do you know why it typically takes years to adopt? Because there are far more people interested in adopting than there are children legally available for adoption. Also, please explain to me why people who are fertile have no duty to "weigh all the children out there that are already born that need families" before trying to get pregnant. Why is it only infertile people who get judged for not adopting?

Adopters are queuing up for the healthy, new born white babies.  Not so much for the older kids, or the ones who didn't win the genetic lottery in this racist, ableist world.  And fertile people with natural-born children don't get to chose their child, but adopters do, so their choices reveal their personal standards and preferences.

[Daleth]

My understanding is that the main health risks of egg donation relate to the drugs necessary to stimulate the ovaries.  You correctly say that the surgery is minor and but completely omit mentioning that the main health risks, including future infertility, come from the drugs needed to stimulate the ovaries.

There is no risk of future infertility, at least none known to science. Show me a study that says otherwise. And you don't need to limit it to studies of egg donors, since the drugs egg donors use are the same ones that women doing IVF with their own eggs use (except that egg donors get much smaller doses, since they are on average much younger and more fertile than women doing IVF with their own eggs). And although you didn't mention it, there's also no known risk of an increase in cancer--the only fertility drug that has been linked to cancer is Clomid, which is not used in IVF or egg donation (it's used for insemination, not IVF). The only other drug linked to cancer and used in IVF is estrogen, which can feed certain breast cancers, but egg donors don't use estrogen--it's used by IVF patients and egg donation RECIPIENTS to prepare the womb for implantation.

The only risk I've ever heard of--and I spent a ton of time looking up studies on PubMed before deciding to go through with IVF--is ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome (OHSS). Including even the mildest forms of it, OHSS affects slightly less than 1% of all IVF patients and donors; serious forms of it are much, much rarer. And it can be avoided completely in either of two ways: (1) monitor the woman receiving drugs (i.e., do blood tests on her) every couple of days, which most clinics do, so that if signs of OHSS appear you can drop the medication doses; or, the best approach, use a particular protocol (combination of medications), because there is only one protocol that is even capable of triggering OHSS--the other protocol used in IVF cycles cannot cause it.

You're making a basic assumption here: that egg and sperm donors are forever anonymous, untrackable, and no medical information is known about them.

Not the case.

And even if it were the case, wouldn't the solution be to fix those problems? Why ban it instead of simply changing the laws so those problems don't exist anymore?

Donor anonymity depends on the jurisdiction.  And even if the donor information is accessible, the child would have to know that they were donor-born, and there is no way to ensure that the parents bringing the child up pass this information on.

Anonymity forbidden: the UK, Australia, Canada, Washington state.
Anonymity required: France, Spain, Czech Republic (but medical information on the donor is collected, including genetic and other test results, and made available to the doctors and patients).
Anonymity optional: the US (but even when anonymous it's not truly anonymous--you see photos of the woman and find out a fair amount about her, and medical information is collected, including genetic and other test results, and made available to the doctors and patients).

I'm not sure what the situation is in South Africa, Greece or Cyprus, all of which are egg donation tourism locations, but I suspect it's similar to the second list of European countries above, except that I have heard that in South Africa you can see pictures of your donor, which isn't the case in that list of countries.

As for whether the kid knows, most parents tell them, all US clinics and fertility psychologists recommend telling them (and you have to meet with a fertility psychologist before undergoing an egg donation cycle), some kids know by default (the children of gay couples or single parents). As for the rest, that minority of kids who neither get told nor know by default? Unless the donor was the same blood type as the parent whose gametes were replaced, they could find out suddenly in a junior high science class. And even if they were the same blood type, you can spit on a Q-tip, mail it in and find out for less than $100 what your ethnic mix is and who your relatives are (I did so and was linked up on Ancestry.com with a cousin who was the child of a second marriage of my grandma's brother--a wife and marriage I had never known about).

And that's the technology available TODAY. It's only going to get easier as the years pass. Long story short, anyone who wants to find out will be able to, and some people who didn't even suspect it will find out by accident.

Do you know why it typically takes years to adopt? Because there are far more people interested in adopting than there are children legally available for adoption. Also, please explain to me why people who are fertile have no duty to "weigh all the children out there that are already born that need families" before trying to get pregnant. Why is it only infertile people who get judged for not adopting?

Adopters are queuing up for the healthy, new born white babies.  Not so much for the older kids, or the ones who didn't win the genetic lottery in this racist, ableist world.  And fertile people with natural-born children don't get to chose their child, but adopters do, so their choices reveal their personal standards and preferences.

You're trotting out the party line, there. It's not true; for instance, a couple I know--an upper middle class white couple with a beautiful home, supportive family, no health problems, etc.--adopted two black toddlers, and it took them four years. And cost them tens of thousands of bucks.

You also avoided answering my second question. Fertile people do get to choose whether to try and get pregnant or to adopt. Why do you only judge *infertile* people for not choosing to adopt?

[totoro]

I agree with your points.   Adoption is only for those who can't have their own naturally?  And those that can't should adopt before using a surrogate?  Says who?

[former player]

My understanding is that the main health risks of egg donation relate to the drugs necessary to stimulate the ovaries.  You correctly say that the surgery is minor and but completely omit mentioning that the main health risks, including future infertility, come from the drugs needed to stimulate the ovaries.

There is no risk of future infertility, at least none known to science. Show me a study that says otherwise.

You say there is no risk, and then go on to say that there is risk from ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome which can be managed.  So there is risk, and you are contradicting yourself inside three paragraphs.  I hope that if you have a formal role in advising on these matters you are rather more careful about making absolute statements which are not true.

You're making a basic assumption here: that egg and sperm donors are forever anonymous, untrackable, and no medical information is known about them.

Not the case.

And even if it were the case, wouldn't the solution be to fix those problems? Why ban it instead of simply changing the laws so those problems don't exist anymore?

Donor anonymity depends on the jurisdiction.  And even if the donor information is accessible, the child would have to know that they were donor-born, and there is no way to ensure that the parents bringing the child up pass this information on.

Anonymity forbidden: the UK, Australia, Canada, Washington state.
Anonymity required: France, Spain, Czech Republic (but medical information on the donor is collected, including genetic and other test results, and made available to the doctors and patients).
Anonymity optional: the US (but even when anonymous it's not truly anonymous--you see photos of the woman and find out a fair amount about her, and medical information is collected, including genetic and other test results, and made available to the doctors and patients).

I'm not sure what the situation is in South Africa, Greece or Cyprus, all of which are egg donation tourism locations, but I suspect it's similar to the second list of European countries above, except that I have heard that in South Africa you can see pictures of your donor, which isn't the case in that list of countries.

As for whether the kid knows, most parents tell them, all US clinics and fertility psychologists recommend telling them (and you have to meet with a fertility psychologist before undergoing an egg donation cycle), some kids know by default (the children of gay couples or single parents). As for the rest, that minority of kids who neither get told nor know by default? Unless the donor was the same blood type as the parent whose gametes were replaced, they could find out suddenly in a junior high science class. And even if they were the same blood type, you can spit on a Q-tip, mail it in and find out for less than $100 what your ethnic mix is and who your relatives are (I did so and was linked up on Ancestry.com with a cousin who was the child of a second marriage of my grandma's brother--a wife and marriage I had never known about).

And that's the technology available TODAY. It's only going to get easier as the years pass. Long story short, anyone who wants to find out will be able to, and some people who didn't even suspect it will find out by accident. ?[/quote]

You are rather making my point for me, that anonymity depends on the jurisdiction and that there is no way to ensure that a donor-conceived child will always know its status.

Do you know why it typically takes years to adopt? Because there are far more people interested in adopting than there are children legally available for adoption. Also, please explain to me why people who are fertile have no duty to "weigh all the children out there that are already born that need families" before trying to get pregnant. Why is it only infertile people who get judged for not adopting?

Adopters are queuing up for the healthy, new born white babies.  Not so much for the older kids, or the ones who didn't win the genetic lottery in this racist, ableist world.  And fertile people with natural-born children don't get to chose their child, but adopters do, so their choices reveal their personal standards and preferences.

You're trotting out the party line, there. It's not true; for instance, a couple I know--an upper middle class white couple with a beautiful home, supportive family, no health problems, etc.--adopted two black toddlers, and it took them four years. And cost them tens of thousands of bucks.

You also avoided answering my second question. Fertile people do get to choose whether to try and get pregnant or to adopt. Why do you only judge *infertile* people for not choosing to adopt?
[/quote]
I talked about tendencies, not absolutes, and your anecdata of the couple you know is not evidence to the contrary.  And where did I say that infertile people should be judged over fertile ones for choosing not to adopt?  You may be addressing the wrong poster with this point.

I posted on this topic only because I was concerned that you were making some absolute statements which were not accurate.  If you could avoid that tendency, I would find your arguments much more persuasive.

[gaja]

Sperm and egg donation might not be a big medical risk, but pregnancy is and birth is. A lot of women die from pregnancies and births, some also after good medical treatment. C-sections add a new level of risk.

[former player]

My understanding is that the main health risks of egg donation relate to the drugs necessary to stimulate the ovaries.  You correctly say that the surgery is minor and but completely omit mentioning that the main health risks, including future infertility, come from the drugs needed to stimulate the ovaries.

There is no risk of future infertility, at least none known to science. Show me a study that says otherwise. [omitted] The only risk I've ever heard of--and I spent a ton of time looking up studies on PubMed before deciding to go through with IVF--is ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome (OHSS).

You say there is no risk, and then go on to say that there is risk from ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome which can be managed.  So there is risk, and you are contradicting yourself inside three paragraphs.  I hope that if you have a formal role in advising on these matters you are rather more careful about making absolute statements which are not true.

You're making a basic assumption here: that egg and sperm donors are forever anonymous, untrackable, and no medical information is known about them.

Not the case.

And even if it were the case, wouldn't the solution be to fix those problems? Why ban it instead of simply changing the laws so those problems don't exist anymore?

Donor anonymity depends on the jurisdiction.  And even if the donor information is accessible, the child would have to know that they were donor-born, and there is no way to ensure that the parents bringing the child up pass this information on.

Anonymity forbidden: the UK, Australia, Canada, Washington state.
Anonymity required: France, Spain, Czech Republic (but medical information on the donor is collected, including genetic and other test results, and made available to the doctors and patients).
Anonymity optional: the US (but even when anonymous it's not truly anonymous--you see photos of the woman and find out a fair amount about her, and medical information is collected, including genetic and other test results, and made available to the doctors and patients).

I'm not sure what the situation is in South Africa, Greece or Cyprus, all of which are egg donation tourism locations, but I suspect it's similar to the second list of European countries above, except that I have heard that in South Africa you can see pictures of your donor, which isn't the case in that list of countries.

As for whether the kid knows, most parents tell them, all US clinics and fertility psychologists recommend telling them (and you have to meet with a fertility psychologist before undergoing an egg donation cycle), some kids know by default (the children of gay couples or single parents). As for the rest, that minority of kids who neither get told nor know by default? Unless the donor was the same blood type as the parent whose gametes were replaced, they could find out suddenly in a junior high science class. And even if they were the same blood type, you can spit on a Q-tip, mail it in and find out for less than $100 what your ethnic mix is and who your relatives are (I did so and was linked up on Ancestry.com with a cousin who was the child of a second marriage of my grandma's brother--a wife and marriage I had never known about).

And that's the technology available TODAY. It's only going to get easier as the years pass. Long story short, anyone who wants to find out will be able to, and some people who didn't even suspect it will find out by accident. ?

You are rather making my point for me, that anonymity depends on the jurisdiction and that there is no way to ensure that a donor-conceived child will always know its status.

Do you know why it typically takes years to adopt? Because there are far more people interested in adopting than there are children legally available for adoption. Also, please explain to me why people who are fertile have no duty to "weigh all the children out there that are already born that need families" before trying to get pregnant. Why is it only infertile people who get judged for not adopting?

Adopters are queuing up for the healthy, new born white babies.  Not so much for the older kids, or the ones who didn't win the genetic lottery in this racist, ableist world.  And fertile people with natural-born children don't get to chose their child, but adopters do, so their choices reveal their personal standards and preferences.

You're trotting out the party line, there. It's not true; for instance, a couple I know--an upper middle class white couple with a beautiful home, supportive family, no health problems, etc.--adopted two black toddlers, and it took them four years. And cost them tens of thousands of bucks.

You also avoided answering my second question. Fertile people do get to choose whether to try and get pregnant or to adopt. Why do you only judge *infertile* people for not choosing to adopt?

I talked about tendencies, not absolutes, and your anecdata of the couple you know is not evidence to the contrary.  And where did I say that infertile people should be judged over fertile ones for choosing not to adopt?  You may be addressing the wrong poster with this point.

I posted on this topic only because I was concerned that you were making some absolute statements which were not accurate.  If you could avoid that tendency, I would find your arguments much more persuasive.

edit: messed up the quotes

[Daleth]

Sperm and egg donation might not be a big medical risk, but pregnancy is and birth is. A lot of women die from pregnancies and births, some also after good medical treatment. C-sections add a new level of risk.

Totally true. I do think people hiring surrogates should pay for life insurance and disability insurance for them for the year that they're being a surrogate (trying to get pregnant, being pregnant, giving birth). It also would make sense to me if each jurisdiction where surrogacy is legal set forth, in its laws, medical criteria that women had to meet in order to be surrogates (at least one previous uncomplicated pregnancy and birth, no history of pregnancy or birth complications, no diabetes, etc.). That being said, at least in the US, agencies that match surrogates with intended parents almost always impose those criteria themselves. Only a disreputable agency would not do so... a disreputable, STUPID one (since those criteria increase the success rates and decrease the failure and catastrophe rates, which is good for PR/word of mouth and thus business).

As a side note, in the US it is almost impossible to determine what risks if any c-sections add because hospitals are not required to break out their c-section data into (1) planned c-sections and (2) c-sections done on an emergent basis when something goes wrong in labor. In other words many "risks of c-section" are not caused by the c-section, but by the problem that made the mom or surrogate need a c-section. In the UK they do break their data out that way, and as it turns out--this is from a three-year study of every birth in the UK, more than 2 million births--a planned c-section is actually less likely to kill the mother than attempting vaginal birth is:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1584671/Women-choosing-caesarean-have-low-death-rate.html (news article)

http://www.bmj.com/rapid-response/2011/11/02/new-research-finds-lowest-maternal-mortality-rate-elective-cesarean-delive (the study itself, in the British Medical Journal)

[Daleth]

My understanding is that the main health risks of egg donation relate to the drugs necessary to stimulate the ovaries.  You correctly say that the surgery is minor and but completely omit mentioning that the main health risks, including future infertility, come from the drugs needed to stimulate the ovaries.

There is no risk of future infertility, at least none known to science. Show me a study that says otherwise. [omitted] The only risk I've ever heard of--and I spent a ton of time looking up studies on PubMed before deciding to go through with IVF--is ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome (OHSS).

You say there is no risk, and then go on to say that there is risk from ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome which can be managed.  So there is risk, and you are contradicting yourself inside three paragraphs.

I said there is no risk of future infertility, and no risk of cancer. Then I said the only risk I am aware of is something else--not infertility, not cancer, and not even remotely related to infertility or cancer--called ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome, which can be managed/prevented. There's nothing contradictory about that at all.

 

You are rather making my point for me, that anonymity depends on the jurisdiction and that there is no way to ensure that a donor-conceived child will always know its status.

The same is true of adoption: parents can lie; laws depend on the jurisdiction; there's no way to ensure that an adopted child will always know its status. So why aren't you arguing that adoption should be banned too? 

Do you know why it typically takes years to adopt? Because there are far more people interested in adopting than there are children legally available for adoption. Also, please explain to me why people who are fertile have no duty to "weigh all the children out there that are already born that need families" before trying to get pregnant. Why is it only infertile people who get judged for not adopting?

Adopters are queuing up for the healthy, new born white babies.  Not so much for the older kids, or the ones who didn't win the genetic lottery in this racist, ableist world.  And fertile people with natural-born children don't get to chose their child, but adopters do, so their choices reveal their personal standards and preferences.

You're trotting out the party line, there. It's not true; for instance, a couple I know--an upper middle class white couple with a beautiful home, supportive family, no health problems, etc.--adopted two black toddlers, and it took them four years. And cost them tens of thousands of bucks.

You also avoided answering my second question. Fertile people do get to choose whether to try and get pregnant or to adopt. Why do you only judge *infertile* people for not choosing to adopt?

I talked about tendencies, not absolutes, and your anecdata of the couple you know is not evidence to the contrary.  And where did I say that infertile people should be judged over fertile ones for choosing not to adopt? 

I at least know something about adoption. For instance, I know people who have adopted and we looked into adoption ourselves, to the point of applying with an adoption agency and attending the first required seminar. Have you done that? Do you know what questions they ask of potential adopted parents, what timelines they state can be expected (how long it takes to bring a child home), etc.? Apparently not, since you think people are only "queuing up for newborn white babies." Anyone who has adopted internationally has, by definition, not adopted a newborn (usually with international adoption the kid is around 1 year old but the typical range is 6 months to 3 years), and unless they adopted from Russia or thereabouts, they have by definition not adopted a white child. It takes years, and costs tens of thousands of dollars, and prospective parents are still queuing out the door and down the street trying ardently to get one of these non-white, non-newborn kids.

And I know how many children in foster care in the US were legally available for adoption at last count. Do you know that? Give me your best guess.

And ok, you didn't specifically say that only infertile people should be judged for choosing not to adopt. But since you did pass judgment on infertile people who choose surrogacy or gamete donation over adoption, tell me this: Do you think fertile people should adopt rather than trying to get pregnant themselves?

[former player]

My concern is that you have stated that there are no risks to egg donation, when there clearly are  (as you have now acknowledged).  I'm not terribly interested in arguing precisely what those risks are, and how great they are, although my information is that ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome, not properly managed, can lead to infertility, so that is a risk.

You made a universal statement about donors not being anonymous which I challenged, in part on the basis of children not being told of their donor conception.  The fact that adopted children might also not be told about their adopted status is true but not relevant to the point I made.

I have never argued that surrogacy, donation or adoption should be banned, and I don't think they should be, so you may again be thinking of another poster here. 

You are trying to put words in my mouth on adoption that I haven't either said or implied.

Look, you are trying to get at the wrong person here. I have nothing against fertility treatment, donor eggs and sperm, or adoption, which are all valid choices for people wanting to have kids.  My concern only was that you were making statements which were untrue because they were wrongly stating absolutes, and you were damaging your own argument by doing so.  Your attempts to attack my attempts at trying to make your arguments more accurate and sustainable do you no favours.  And I'm out of this conversation.