‘Those who used surrogacy should lab-check their child’s genes’

National awardwinning writer Pinki Virani has been a trenchant observer of the lsquocommodification of babies the ruthlessness of the fertilityindustry on womenrsquos bodies and its resultant reduction of motherhoodrsquo in India Last week the central government notified the Surrogacy Regulation Act 2021 and the Assisted Reproductive Technology Regulation Act 2021 These hope to regulate invitro fertilisation IVF clinics and prohibit commercial surrogacy or lsquowombsonhirersquo It does allow altruistic surrogacy where the birthmother a relative of the couple is to be covered on all medical and insurance expenditure Since the patriarchal pressure continues to be very real especially upon women of ensuring a child critics fear that commercial surrogacy is likely to go undergroundExcerpts from the interviewThe new Surrogacy Act bans commercial surrogacy and the ART Act bans sperm male and ovum ova oocyte female egg sales How do you view thisIrsquove been a part of some of the processes on both laws since 2016 My own prior research for the book had proved that if the Parliamentdidnrsquot put its foot down our young girls were increasingly at risk of being sucked into moneymaking monstermachineEqually at risk were middleclass women Those who read both Acts will also realise that once money is removed from the surrogacy equation these laws put back the power of choice where it truly belongsmdashin the hands of women In the absence of any regulation earlier womenrsquos bodies and emotions had been exploited mercilesslymdash by their own greedy families toomdashand all of it was allowed in the name of yettobeborn babies It had become both a body and baby bazaarWhat is your response to the critics who say that commercial surrogacy will now be carried out surreptitiously May I point out that the ART Act makes it less complicated for patients to go to licensed registered clinics Couples have the choice of going to these clinics if they have been unable to conceive naturally Itrsquos misleading when surrogacy is promoted by some as the automatic gotoI must add here that once laws are made itrsquos up to the government as also the police to ensure that swift punishment is meted out to those who break it beginning with the ldquofertilityindustryrdquo Would you agree that adoption delay is one of the key reasons why couples turn to questionable means to acquire a childShould we be equating adoption with desperation Itrsquos a wellthought out decision by the adopter who is prepared to go through the sort of screening that really every wanttobe biological parent should be put through to understand that children are not a right but a responsibility The adoption of a child or children is a noble act by adults be they married or single Those who adopt children are to be admired and supported because raising an adopted child has its own set of complexities As for those who are buying babiesmdashin effect becoming humantraffickers themselvesmdashthey need to stop to consider why exactly they are becoming criminalsHow do the ART Act and the Surrogacy Act which lets a woman choose if she wants to be an altruistic surrogate make it better for every party involvedSurrogacy is a part of thirdparty reproduction 3pr Another part of 3pr is the salepurchase of sperm and egg There have been no lsquodonorsrsquo only buyers and sellers A film like Vicky Donor paints the wrong picture because onscreen he sold sperm without any medical checks and balancesThe ART Act expects appropriate screening of what would amount to genuine donors whose spermegg usage will not be hyperrepeated thereby reducing the risk of geneticsiblings growing to have sex with each other as adults Yes this has been known to happen and itrsquos revoltingAll of 3pr is part of IVF invitro fertilisation In 3pr any number of combinations can be brought into play between male sperm female egg and female uterus To understand this letrsquos look at our own parents Spermproviders are our biological fathers Our mothers are both our genetic ovum mothers and our birth pregnancydelivery mothers This combination makes our mothers our biological mothersInfertile couples who feel pressured to immediately go to IVF clinics should know that the failure rate is 75 per cent Tonnes of money is to be made per IVF cycle which also accounts for the shady ldquoIVF clinicsrdquo that have sprouted in every Indian town The ART Act now puts a stop to such charlatans posing as fertilitydoctorsAfter repeated cycles with the couplersquos eggspermuterus if there is no pregnancy leading to a lsquotakehome babyrsquo so termed because the motherchild hospitalisation and complicationrates are high more so in surrogacy brought into play is 3pr A strangerrsquos sperm a strangerrsquos egg a strangerrsquos uterus sometimes the same strangerrsquos egg and uterus which would make the woman the childrsquos biological mothermdashall combinations are made possible but not necessarily conveyed to the couple Is it the intendingfatherrsquos sperm being paired with the intendingmotherrsquos egg Or is it another couplersquos leftover sperm or egg Or has it been purchased from the market where a lsquodonorrsquo is claimed to be of a certain age height colour education and is perhaps only one of the above What about that lsquodonorrsquosrsquo mentalhealth historymdashmental illnesses can be genetic too or herhis familyrsquos cancer history All of this can have consequences for the intendedchild but by that time the babymaking factoryrsquos conveyorbelt is on a roll The sperm and egg are fused in the lab to make embryos In the natural babymaking process one embryo selfforms inside the wombIn rare cases there are more leading to the birth of twins or more The labgrown embryos can only be inserted into the woman after her body is chemicallytricked into thinking shersquos undergoing menopause otherwise she would get her period and the embryo wonrsquot lsquocatchrsquoWhen this temporary minimenopause is in play the embryos are inserted and then gummed into place with a series of chemicals and hormones through injections into the tummy and vaginal pessaries And yet they donrsquot always stick Then itrsquos onto the next round of the same process Purely as recent examples if one embryo sticks actor Priyanka ChopraJonas gets a surrogatemotherrsquos birthchild If more than one embryo sticks director Karan Johar takes home twins but not their birthmother nor their geneticmother Do they share the same birthmother This would be known only to the ldquofertility specialistrdquo both Acts stop thisBy mentioning lsquolimitation of their own bodiesrsquo you are saying that there are short and longterm effects of ART and surrogacy tooUnfortunately Bollywood insists on making it look simplistic No ill should ever be wished upon a baby but international research shows that there can be longlasting negative effects of these procedures on the child as also the mother whether she is the birthmother the eggmother or both