Gay Men Buy Designer Babies In The US
Pastor Dale Morgan
Mar 27th, 2007 8:49 AM
*Gay Men Buy Designer Babies In The US*
By CLODAGH HARTLEY
BRITISH gay men are paying a US clinic £33,000 a time to create a
designer baby.
Twenty couples have already used the specialist surrogacy scheme for
“two-dad” families — 15 choosing to have a boy.
Another 25 have made inquiries.
They are turning to the US because of the shortage of donated eggs and
surrogate mothers in Britain.
The Fertility Institutes clinic in Los Angeles buys eggs from university
students aged 18 to 27. They are fertilised by IVF with sperm from one
of the men and implanted in a different woman, who gets £15,000 to act
as surrogate mum. The scheme is designed to maximise the chance of an
intelligent and healthy tot.
Clinic director, Dr Jeffrey Steinberg, said: “University students are
not interested in carrying the baby. The surrogates are interested but a
lot of the time they are blue collar. We get the best egg donors and the
best women to carry the babies, which is the perfect combination.”
It is thought to be the world’s first scheme for gay men — who face
difficulties in Britain where it is illegal to pay surrogate mums and
egg donors.
Britain is making easier for lesbians to start a family. Last year,
Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt introduced laws proposing women should
be allowed IVF without a father for the baby.
Critics of the US programme say it is the “ultimate in the manufacture
of the bio-baby”.
Anti-IVF group Comment on Reproductive Ethics said: “On the one hand, in
the UK, we are saying that a child doesn’t need a father, but in America
we are saying that two fathers is a good idea.”
© 2006 News Group Newspapers Ltd.