If you have time to read this article – great – if not, I’m going to point out some common biases (bolded text) in the discussion of surrogacy in India.
Here is one excerpt from the article:
“The women—all married and with at least one previous child—have traded the comforts of home to enroll as laborers in India's burgeoning medical tourism industry. Most will spend their entire pregnancies living in this building. In exchange for the inconvenience and physical discomforts, they stand to receive a sum that's quite substantial by their meager standards, but which the clinic's customers understand is a steal.”
1. Both traditional clinics, where the surrogate woman lives at home during gestation, and dormitory style clinics, such as Dr. Patel’s, where the surrogate lives at the clinic for the nine months of the pregnancy and one month following, are available throughout India. Therefore, these women chose to live in the dormitory style clinic.
2. Most women that choose a dormitory style clinic come from poor rural areas. It is more likely that the conditions in the clinic are better than the conditions of their home. They are fed three meals a day, have 24 hour access to health care, and receive English tutoring. In addition, one might argue that the camaraderie fostered by living with other Indian surrogates provides social and/or psychological benefits.
3. Dormitory style clinics provide safer living and delivery conditions than most surrogates are afforded during their own pregnancies. Two-thirds of maternal deaths occur in a handful of poor rural states. Often these deaths occur during home deliveries and as a result of the inability to receive medical attention in time. This is particularly true of distance tribal communities. Surrogacy arrangements are many women’s only opportunity to receive comprehensive health care and insurance coverage.
4. The cost of surrogacy in India is one third of the cost of surrogacy in the U.S. or U.K., but the fee the surrogate receives is relatively higher than the fee a U.S. surrogate receives. In the U.S., $15,000 - 20,000 (typical compensation) cannot buy a house or send even one child to college. In India, $5,000 - $7,000 (typical compensation) is equal to a lifetime’s worth of work for most women – this fee can buy a home for the family or send all of their children to college.
Thoughts? Comments? Opinions?
