Should surrogacy be banned in Russia

Last chance

Olga Isupova, Forbes, 03.04.2017

How does the situation around surrogacy in Russia differ from the practice of other countries and are there objective reasons for its prohibition

On March 27, 2017, a bill on the prohibition of surrogacy in Russia was submitted to the State Duma, authored by Anton Belyakov, a member of the Federation Council. He argued the initiative as follows: in many states (for example, Austria, Germany and Norway) surrogacy is generally prohibited, in others strict restrictions have been introduced, up to the prohibition of commercial surrogacy – and Russia belongs to the countries with the most liberal and least developed legislation in this area, which is why it has become one of the centers of "reproductive tourism". The senator proposes to temporarily ban surrogacy until a new approach to it is developed in Russia, "protecting the rights and interests of children, surrogate mothers and potential parents."

Moreover, Belyakov considers surrogacy a negative factor for the development of the child and a "gross violation" of his rights. For the author of the bill, as for many other conservative-minded people, it is difficult to realize that with the development of science, biological motherhood has become possible to divide into two parts – genetic and gestational. Belyakov calls the surrogate mother "native", although he himself emphasizes that she has no genetic connection with the child, and claims that the rupture of the connection formed in the infant with the carrying mother has harmful consequences for him.

However, the opinion that the connection between a child and a pregnant mother is so significant is not confirmed by science. A "break in connection" also occurs when a mother abandons a child at birth and is adopted and raised by other people. This practice has always existed in the history of mankind, and studies do not show significant developmental abnormalities in children adopted in this way. The situation with surrogacy differs from adoption even in a slightly more favorable way from the point of view of the prognosis of the development of the relationship between parents and the child, because we are talking about a long-awaited child with whom the parents have a genetic connection.

In this area, much depends not only on how conservative the legislators are, but also on how the accents are placed. Currently, in the United States and other countries where surrogacy technology is allowed, surrogate mothers are usually called "pregnancy carriers", this has become an established term, since there are fewer negative associations associated with it.

The statement that Russian legislation in the field of surrogacy is "one of the most liberal in the world" may be correct, but there are also more developed countries where it is even more liberal. For example, "traditional surrogate motherhood", when the sperm of the future father is placed into the uterus of the carrier of pregnancy by insemination (that is, the surrogate mother is also genetic in this case), and she gives the child to him and his wife after gestation, is prohibited in Russia, and is often used in the USA. Everywhere in the world (including in Russia) it is prohibited to use the services of a pregnancy carrier for social, not medical reasons.

There are not so few countries in the world where the use of the services of a pregnancy carrier is allowed – 24; it is prohibited in 36 countries. In eight countries, carrying someone else's pregnancy is allowed only on condition that the child does not have the genes of the carrying mother. Reimbursement of the time and expenses of pregnancy carriers is allowed in four countries, in four more the payment may be higher. At the same time, in most countries, according to the law, the carrier of pregnancy has a priority right to the child, genetic parents need to get her formal consent to transfer it to them.

Feelings for a child do not always arise in a pregnant mother, otherwise such a technology could not exist in principle. If this does happen, the law, including the Russian one, grants her the right to keep the child for herself. Her rights are thus sufficiently protected. As for the anonymity of the carrier of pregnancy, here we can recall the rights of genetic parents to have the exclusive right to a child. Why, after all, is the secret of adoption protected in our country, and open adoption is not widespread? Guided by the logic of the proposed initiative, it is necessary to change the legislation in this area as well: there are no fundamental differences between these two situations – let parents who have abandoned their children in the maternity hospital have the full right to come to the adoptive parents at any time and claim the children. In this case, however, it may turn out that the number of adoptive parents will decrease dramatically. But are the authors of the bill interested in this?

Not to mention the fact that surrogacy is often the last chance for a woman to have her own child genetically; that pregnant women in a situation of economic crisis often have no chance to find another job paid at least twice as low as their reproductive services, or combine it with the upbringing of their own children. But, according to the law, they must have their own children, and they often need home-based and light work.

After all, why is our attention constantly drawn to this particular topic? According to statistics, there are no more than 500 cases of surrogacy in Russia per year, and in total, more than one and a half million children are born in our rather big country annually. Do we not have more important problems related to child poverty, the health of mothers and children, the quality of school education, after all? Wouldn't the approach of prohibitions be more productive, but the desire to reasonably improve the lives of families and children, or at least not to prevent them from solving these issues on their own – to mutual satisfaction and by legal means?

Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru  04.04.2017