Category: Reproductive Rights

New Surrogacy Guidelines Ignore Calls for Abolition – The Center for Bioethics & Culture Network

According to a recent international announcement on surrogacy guidelines, leading fertility organizations—including ASPIRE, ESHRE, ASRM, and IFFS—have collaborated to develop “minimum standards” for surrogacy practices worldwide. The effort is presented (should we say masqueraded) as a response to mounting concern over exploitation and inconsistent regulation.

However, this framing sits uneasy alongside the broader international context and seems to be a move of desperation from those at the top of the fertility food chain rather than true care for women, children, and families. These “guidelines” come in the wake of a clear and urgent call from the United Nations to move toward the abolition of surrogacy due to its inherent risks of exploitation.

Specifically, the recent report by UN Special Rapporteur Reem Alsalem, interestingly cited at ASPIRE, calls not for improved regulation, but for dismantling the system altogether – through the abolition of surrogacy. Against this backdrop, industry-led “self-regulation” appears not as a solution, but as deflection and strategy for preservation. These guidelines are being advanced in the name of “international cooperation,” yet they emerge from within the same sector that benefits directly from surrogacy arrangements.

If the goal is truly to uphold human rights, the conversation must continue to move beyond regulation toward abolition. Anything less risks entrenching the very harms that the international community has begun to acknowledge—and condemn.

Source: New Surrogacy Guidelines Ignore Calls for Abolition – The Center for Bioethics & Culture Network

Move towards global consensus guidelines on surrogacy with mounting concerns over human rights violations | PR Newswire

BEIJING, May 7, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — World leaders in assisted reproductive technology are finalising global consensus guidelines on minimal standards in surrogacy to address mounting concerns about severe human rights violations.

The standards will attempt to tackle inconsistent or inadequate regulation of the practice, particularly in settings where there is disempowerment of women and girls including violence, abuse and exploitation of surrogates.

It is a move being propelled by a global collaboration between the Asia Pacific Initiative on Reproduction (ASPIRE), the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE), the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM), and the International Federation of Fertility Societies (IFFS).

It was spearheaded by ASPIRE and during discussions between the global consensus group the United Nations (UN) issued a report calling for its 193 member States to move towards eradicating surrogacy in all its forms. The report, presented at the UN General Assembly in October 2025, said the member States should adopt a legal and policy framework for surrogacy pending its abolition.

The first draft consensus guidelines on surrogacy developed by representatives of the peak fertility societies will be presented for the first time at the ASPIRE 2026 Congress in Beijing this week, a meeting that will be attended by around 3,000 fertility specialists from across the world.

Source: Move towards global consensus guidelines on surrogacy with mounting concerns over human rights violations

Australian Law Reform Commission inquiry into surrogacy: Three women changed my mind on surrogacy | SMH | Jenna Price

This moment is a tipping point for surrogacy in Australia. Do we stay with the model of what we call “altruistic surrogacy”, doing it for love, kindness or charity? Or do we go with “compensated surrogacy”, a coded word for payment for the surrogate mother that goes beyond the bare expenses? It’s used instead of the more honest “commercial surrogacy” because that seems too much like we are buying and selling babies.

The ALRC was asked to inquire into surrogacy laws in Australia under the chairmanship of Justice Mordy Bromberg. Its report to federal Attorney-General Michelle Rowland will be delivered in a few weeks. Its advisory committee, now disbanded, looks like fan fiction for the commercial surrogacy lobby, with some prominent fertility lawyers among its cast.

Believe me, I understand the nearly overwhelming desire to have a baby. When I met my husband, I wanted six. Fortunately, sense, my lovely spouse and exhaustion after three kids prevailed. He was also the one who had the good sense to steer me away from becoming a surrogate for my sister. He was right. I might have handed the kid over, but I would never have been able to relinquish my motherhood. My sister never had kids. She died. Our relationship never recovered.

But I remained a firm supporter of surrogacy for decades, for other people, if not for me. Earlier this year, I spoke to three women who changed my mind. Australia finally apologised for the pain of forced adoptions, but these women explained how much surrogacy has in common with that barbaric practice.

Patricia Harper, one of the early founders of the National Council for Single Mothers and their Children, discovered the ALRC inquiry had no room for women affected by adoption. She had held tight to her daughter Ruth in 1968, when friends, families, strangers, all tried to force Patricia’s hand because she had no husband. Lily Clifford, one of the founders of the Association of Relinquishing Mothers, had her son removed in 1972 because she was not married to the baby’s father. And I spoke to Sarah Dingle, author of Brave New Humans, who discovered in her 20s that she was donor-conceived with no way of discovering who her father was. She argues that when children are a result of surrogacy, there are many ways they may be sold, isolated from their families and/or lied to.

Not one of these women was called to take part in consultations with the surrogacy inquiry. Not one. Despite their intense understanding of the pain of relinquishment, the pain of distance.

Commercial surrogacy is banned in this country. And, for those who don’t know, the surrogacy laws in NSW, Queensland and the ACT also make it a criminal offence for their residents to travel overseas and engage in commercial surrogacy. As I understand, there has never been a prosecution for accessing commercial surrogacy.

As with any commercial transaction, lots can go very wrong. If the ALRC report goes in favour of compensated surrogacy, the name change won’t make it any safer. And it won’t protect the babies, the children or the adults.

Let’s honour Sonia Allan, eminent legal academic in surrogacy law, who died in March. Her last letter to Justice Bromberg asked the inquiry to consider the interests of the children. They are the ones who suffer. We can’t ban surrogacy. But please, please, let’s protect children from being just another transaction in our commodified lives.

Source: Australian Law Reform Commission inquiry into surrogacy: Three women changed my mind on surrogacy

Home of Barrie Drewitt-Barlow – one of ‘Britain’s first gay dads’ – is raided as police probe alleged rape and human trafficking for sexual exploitation | Daily Mail Online

The home of reality TV star and Britain’s first openly gay football club owner Barrie Drewitt-Barlow has been raided by police as part of an investigation into alleged human trafficking for sexual exploitation and rape.

Multi-millionaire Drewitt-Barlow, who bought non-league Maldon and Tiptree FC last February and is one half of ‘Britain’s first gay dads’, lives in the plush Essex mansion with husband, Scott Hutchison.

Essex Police later confirmed that two men – aged 57 and 32 – were arrested on suspicion of rape, human trafficking for sexual exploitation and administering a noxious substance.

Drewitt-Barlow and his ex-husband made headlines in 1999 when they became one of the first gay couples in the UK to have children through a surrogate mother.

Source: Home of Barrie Drewitt-Barlow – one of ‘Britain’s first gay dads’ – is raided as police probe alleged rape and human trafficking for sexual exploitation | Daily Mail Online

In the Matter of X and Y – by Dr Barbara Sumner

In the matter of X and Y1, concerned two young women who had returned to live with their mother. Their adopter, supportive of their choice, submitted an application to revoke the adoption orders on their behalf. Their mother supported it. The young women themselves supported it.

It went all the way to the Court of Appeal. What they were asking for was not radical. They were asking, as adults, to have their legal status reflect the actual truth of their lives.

When a child is adopted, the law erases their biological identity and replaces it with a legal one, presented as a win/win, a gift even – for the adopted person and their adopters.

Just as parenthood cannot be undone, the argument goes, adoption cannot simply be reversed. It is this constant reaching for equivalence that defines human adoption.

So: two adult women, unanimous biological and adoptological family support. And the esteemed judges said NO.

Why and how they came to this conclusion is at the heart of adoption practice.

Source: In the Matter of X and Y – by Dr Barbara Sumner

Why I Speak Out Against Surrogacy | Olivia Maurel – YouTube

Male surrogacy betrays our inability to say ‘no’ | The Times

Government websites accept surrogacy “regardless of relationship status”, whereas if you want to adopt there are months of home visits and references, including from any ex-partner from the past ten years. A social worker will “explore” how divorce or separation might have “impacted” your life.

So there we are: a world which once shuddered at the idea that you could buy a baby off a total stranger has pretty much accepted it. And last week we heard that after a 2019 UK ruling that single people could be parents through surrogacy, 170 lone men have done it.

And with all due respect to the millions of men who are mild and even selflessly motherly, this is a sharp reminder of how far we have travelled down an unmapped road. Half of all physical abuse and 91 per cent of sexual abuse of children is by men. Very few men are paedophiles, but those who are have been found to be typically careful planners.

Even if you lay that horror thought aside, the fact is that women, while far from perfect, are statistically safer. And new babies are fragile, irrational and at times enraging. If I were a poor woman in Colombia, driven to support my family by going through medical interventions and a host pregnancy, I would want to know a lot about the nature, stamina and virtue of the rich foreigner taking the infant that kicked inside me for months. This, however, is very rarely the deal.

So think not only about the babies, whisked away to avoid bonding (you’re not allowed to do that with puppies, by the way). Think about the women: not the publicised few who generously do it for gay men or childless friends but those at the sharp end. The only research shows that they suffer more than average from neonatal medical and mental problems.

Source: Male surrogacy betrays our inability to say ‘no’

Single men shouldn’t be able to have a surrogate baby | The Spectator

Should single men be allowed to buy a baby? Obviously not, you might think. But since 2019 British men have been legally allowed to obtain a child though the surrogacy process.

When a baby is born to a surrogate, they are often taken from their mother shortly afterwards, to prevent infant and mother bonding (in this country it is illegal to take a puppy from its mother before it is eight weeks old). A man can then apply for a ‘parental order’, in which a court will legally make them the child’s parent, without the full checks which an adoption would require. In the UK it is illegal to ‘pay’ a woman to be a surrogate but ‘reasonable expenses’ are typically between £10,000 to £15,000 – and can exceed £20,000.

And this only applies in the UK. Almost three-quarters of parental orders are now granted in relation to babies born abroad. This means that people are going overseas and buying babies via commercial surrogacy, circumventing the British ban on this practice.

The truth is that surrogacy is bad for mothers. They are more likely to develop new mental health problems both during and after pregnancy. This is unsurprising – to carry and birth a child knowing that you are going to immediately hand it over to a stranger is to reject every natural maternal instinct. What may be more surprising is that surrogacy is physically dangerous too. Research from 2024, which studied 860,000 births over a decade, found that surrogate mothers are over three times more likely to experience severe complications including sepsis, pre-eclampsia and postpartum haemorrhage.

[I]n Britain, since 2019, single men have also been allowed to buy babies. In that time 170 men have applied for parental orders.

This is even worse than allowing men to work in nurseries. We know that men are vastly more likely to abuse unrelated children than women are. We know that 91.3 per cent of child sexual abusers are male. And we know that paedophiles relentlessly seek out opportunities to access victims. The chance of single parent abuser being caught will be very low, given they may well be the only adult who has regular contact with the child.

In our pursuit of a society where we never say ‘no’ to anyone, we have created a legal structure which allows men to buy babies. Many of those 170 men may well be good at caring for their children, but the risk they pose on average to these babies is far too high. It’s time to start saying no. It might be very sad for some people that they can’t have children, but life is full of sadness and disappointment. We should not sacrifice mothers and babies in a vain effort to ensure that no one ever feels they missed out.

Source: Single men shouldn’t be able to have a surrogate baby | The Spectator

Should surrogates be paid for carrying other people’s babies? And how much would be enough? | The Conversation

The Australian Law Reform Commission is currently reviewing Australia’s surrogacy laws to ensure they’re fit for purpose and reflect the population’s current views.

One aspect being considered is whether surrogates should be allowed to receive financial payments for gestating a fetus on behalf of another person or couple.

The commission’s final report is expected in July.

Currently, only “altruistic” surrogacy arrangements are permitted. This means the surrogate volunteers to carry the pregnancy and receives no financial incentive or compensation for the time or risk involved.

“Commercial” surrogacy arrangements are available in some countries around the world, meaning surrogates are able to contract their gestational services for a fee. Examples include Georgia, Ukraine and some states in the United States.

One study of ten surrogacy agencies in the US found significant variation in the amount commercial surrogates were paid. They report most “compensation packages” were listed in the range US$30,000–70,000, but it was not always clear what the breakdown for these packages was.

Another study of 30 specific contracts cited rates of US$18,000–$50,000, with an average payment of US$23,000.

In India, commercial surrogacy arrangements involving foreign nationals were banned in 2015. This ban was then extended to everyone by 2022

Before this, the average payment reported for commercial surrogates was US$5,000.

Thailand followed a similar pattern. Once a major hub for international commercial surrogacy, it also banned the practice in 2015.

The much publicised case of “baby Gammy” a child born through commercial surrogacy in Thailand, is often cited as the catalyst for the changes in surrogacy law in Thailand and beyond.

Baby Gammy was the genetic child of an Australian commissioning couple. But he was born with Down syndrome and a congenital heart condition and was not brought back to Australia with his twin sister.

This sparked international concern over the ethical and legal obligations to children and surrogates involved in transnational surrogacy arrangements. [Ed: Not to mention that the commissioning father was a convicted pedophile! Why is this not mentioned?]

Another potential type of paid surrogacy arrangement Australia might consider is “compensated”, rather than “commercial” surrogacy.

In a compensated model, surrogates would be paid a standardised rate for each month of completed gestation, in addition to having their expenses reimbursed. The regulation of the standard fee is often considered the key difference to the commercial model, with no bidding or broker competition allowed.

Israel’s unique state-controlled surrogacy payment model is arguably one example of this type of arrangement. While still typically referred to as “altruistic” rather than “commercial”, this model does allow strictly regulated payments to compensate a surrogate’s “time and suffering”, rather than just permitting reimbursement of direct expenses.

How could a fair price be calculated?

[Ed: There is no fair price for a human life.]

One way to determine a fair price for compensated surrogacy in Australia would be to make the rate similar to what surrogates are paid for commercial surrogacy in other high income countries, such as the US.

Multiple submissions to the Australian Law Reform Commission’s review of surrogacy laws suggested A$1,000–$2,000 per month would be reasonable, based on the results of these kinds of discussions. This is 20–50% of minimum wage.

Another method would be just to use minimum wage as the rate, equating to just over A$4,000 a month.

Also, this would be one occupation where it is not only possible but essential that you sleep on the job.

Would a reduced rate be payable if the surrogate was otherwise employed during the same “work hours”? Or would a surrogacy payment be better classified as an additional loading on top of their regular salary? How would surrogacy as a “second job” be taxed?

The review of Australia’s surrogacy laws is trying to ensure couples aren’t forced to travel overseas to have a family. If the commission recommends adding compensated surrogacy as an option in Australia, and the government accepts this recommendation, more debates are likely to follow.

[Ed: No one is forced to go overseas because having children is not compulsory. Suggesting people should be able to buy a baby for sums they would pay for a car is unethical in the extreme. Women and children are not for sale.]

Source: Should surrogates be paid for carrying other people’s babies? And how much would be enough?

Surrogacy: Family stranded and surrogate allegedly ‘exploited’ by company | SMH

McCann found herself questioning how she and her wife, Gail, had been sucked into censured Melbourne lawyer Paul Norris-Ongso’s “crazy car salesman” trappings with his company Global Surrogacy, and his $100,000 contract seemingly full of false promises.

This masthead has spoken to numerous former clients, a surrogate, and former staff, all of whom accused Norris-Ongso of running an unethical enterprise that links international clients with women in developing countries.

Norris-Ongso has three children born to two surrogate mothers with his husband. Global Surrogacy has since rebranded to KinPath Surrogacy. He no longer holds an Australian legal practising certificate and, in 2019, was subject to disciplinary action by the Victorian Legal Services Commissioner.

In 2023, the Canberra couple transferred close to $100,000 to Norris-Ongso and his company, Global Surrogacy, to expand their family after McCann recovered from ovarian cancer.

“I told [Norris-Ongso] I did not want an unethical program,” McCann said. She told him she wanted a relationship with the surrogate.

They were matched with Martinez, a stay-at-home mother of two from Colombia’s north. Martinez saw surrogacy as a way to support her family while helping another. She said she regretted her decision to become a surrogate after her experience with Global Surrogacy.

The McCanns said they were told that Martinez would be paid about $40,000.

However, Martinez’s contract, which she had to screenshot because it was set to “view once”, stipulated 10 monthly payments of $900, insurance and social security, and a $10,500 post-birth bonus. Medical-related costs were also included. Her total direct payments amounted to just over $20,000, half of what the McCanns believed she was being paid.

Norris-Ongso denied telling the McCanns a payment amount. He said that, on average, Colombian surrogates received $20,000 directly, with another $20,000 covering insurance, medical fees, transport, translation and operating costs.

The McCanns were added to a group chat with Martinez that was monitored by Norris-Ongso. Martinez said she was told that it was illegal under Australian law for her to contact the McCanns independently.

Norris-Ongso said that Global Surrogacy was one of the few agencies that contractually required clients to communicate with their surrogates and to be able to contact them freely, with translators and interpreters provided on request.

At 18 weeks’, the McCanns travelled to Colombia for the gender scan. There, they learnt how Martinez was being treated. “She was basically exploited, something shocking,” Melinda said. “She was violently ill, and they did nothing.”

Later, the company ordered Martinez to travel alone to Bogotá – a 17-hour drive, or 90-minute flight – to give birth, contrary to her original doctor’s advice and with no plan for who would care for her children.

Martinez gave birth via caesarean in October 2024 at a hospital near her home city. She said she was not allowed to have her mother or another support person in the delivery room. McCann stood beside her, watching the delivery.

Instead of the promised lump sum, Martinez was paid in instalments over weeks, causing her to lose a house she intended to buy.

“[I felt that] I’d given birth, I was useless now,” she said. She has struggled with the separation from the baby, and said she wished there was mental health support to help cope.

Meanwhile, the McCanns entered a bureaucratic nightmare. Melinda said Norris-Ongso failed to file citizenship paperwork accurately. After he stopped responding to calls, the McCanns appealed to the media and Senator David Pocock. Alexis was finally granted citizenship after two months had passed.

[Ed: There is no such thing as an ethical surrogacy program.]

Source: Surrogacy: Family stranded and surrogate allegedly ‘exploited’ by company