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Health department sends bill banning surrogate childbirth

The Department of Health plans to ban surrogate motherhood and has recently completed a bill governing artificial fertilization and births, Chinese-language media reported yesterday.

The bill is now on its way to the Legislative Yuan for review.

Chen Chao-tzu (陳昭姿), chief pharmacologist and pro-surrogate motherhood activist at the Koo Foundation Sun Yat-sen Cancer Center (和信醫院), slammed the department over the proposed ban, according to the report.

Chen also predicted that it would be difficult for the bill to pass, saying that several dozen legislators have already shown support for surrogate motherhood.

Chen said the ban is unfair to several thousand women in the country who are fertile but unable to bear children because of various health problems.

The bill also imposes age limits on people who can participate in artificial fertilization -- 60 for men and 50 for women.

The age limits are aimed at barring older people from producing test-tube babies, which can result in a variety of health problems in the child including pregnancy toxemia and chromosome abnormalities.

The department also plans to formulate bylaws regulating reimbursements for sperm and ovum donors.

The age limits have drawn criticism.

Li Maosheng (李茂盛), chairman of the Taiwan Association of Obstetrics and Gynecology, said in a report that an increasing number of people are thinking of having children in or even after middle age.

Setting age limits in the law may deprive them of their right to have children, Li said.

The report also quoted Chang Ming-yang (張明揚), chairman of the Taiwan Society of Reproductive Medicine, as saying that the number of men siring children in their 60s and 70s is on the rise, and setting age limits on artificial fertilization will affect the rights of people who would also like to do so.
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