Some consider it medical progress, but baby gender selection in conservative Egypt has caused a stir among traditionalists who see it as an affront to ethics and have lashed out at clinics offering the service.
Ashraf Sabry, a medical doctor, has defied social opposition and uses in vitro fertilization (IVF) technology to allow the sex of unborn babies to be chosen by their parents, many of whom yearn for a son.
“Many patients already have girls and would like a child of the opposite sex,” Sabry said at his clinic in Cairo, one of about 50 in Egypt that offer the treatment.
Sometimes “families are desperate for a boy to carry the family name,” he said.
In a country where more than 40 percent of the population lives below the poverty line according to World Bank figures, gender selection is out of the reach of most Egyptians. The procedure costs between US$4,000 and US$5,000.
“I am married and I am a mother to four girls,” one former patient said.
“My husband and I met with Dr Sabry and thanks to IVF we have a little boy who is now two years old,” she said.
The argument that the procedure will alter demographics has been rejected by some doctors.
“We are not changing the balance of the sexes. It is still God that decides whether the procedure succeeds or not,” Cairo gynecologist Ehab Suleiman said.
The practice has divided Muslim scholars. A leading Egyptian cleric, who asked not to be named, denied it was even possible to choose the sex of a child, saying that only God could decide the fetus’ gender.
A group of Egyptian lawmakers recently presented a draft bill to parliament aimed at managing IVF treatment and banning sex selection for convenience purposes.
The Muslim Brotherhood, which controls a fifth of Egypt’s parliament, is opposed to the practice. Akram al-Shaer, a Brotherhood parliamentarian who sits on the health committee, said the law would probably be debated in the next parliamentary session.
He said the Brotherhood supports banning gender selection.
“Involvement in this matter is unacceptable. It opens the door to corruption, no one can tell where it would lead. It could destroy society,” he said.
However, others have permitted it on grounds of necessity, and with tight restrictions.
Even within medical circles, there is hardly a consensus on the issue.
“I don’t see the point of choosing a boy or a girl if a couple has had no children before,” said Abdelshahid Azer, a physician and IVF specialist who refuses to select embryos based on their sex.
“As for children who have two or three girls or more, if this creates a problem for them they should consult a religious authority,” he said.
THE ‘MONSTER’: The Philippines on Saturday sent a vessel to confront a 12,000-tonne Chinese ship that had entered its exclusive economic zone The Philippines yesterday said it deployed a coast guard ship to challenge Chinese patrol boats attempting to “alter the existing status quo” of the disputed South China Sea. Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Commodore Jay Tarriela said Chinese patrol ships had this year come as close as 60 nautical miles (111km) west of the main Philippine island of Luzon. “Their goal is to normalize such deployments, and if these actions go unnoticed and unchallenged, it will enable them to alter the existing status quo,” he said in a statement. He later told reporters that Manila had deployed a coast guard ship to the area
HOLLYWOOD IN TURMOIL: Mandy Moore, Paris Hilton and Cary Elwes lost properties to the flames, while awards events planned for this week have been delayed Fires burning in and around Los Angeles have claimed the homes of numerous celebrities, including Billy Crystal, Mandy Moore and Paris Hilton, and led to sweeping disruptions of entertainment events, while at least five people have died. Three awards ceremonies planned for this weekend have been postponed. Next week’s Oscar nominations have been delayed, while tens of thousands of city residents had been displaced and were awaiting word on whether their homes survived the flames — some of them the city’s most famous denizens. More than 1,900 structures had been destroyed and the number was expected to increase. More than 130,000 people
A group of Uyghur men who were detained in Thailand more than one decade ago said that the Thai government is preparing to deport them to China, alarming activists and family members who say the men are at risk of abuse and torture if they are sent back. Forty-three Uyghur men held in Bangkok made a public appeal to halt what they called an imminent threat of deportation. “We could be imprisoned and we might even lose our lives,” the letter said. “We urgently appeal to all international organizations and countries concerned with human rights to intervene immediately to save us from
RISING TENSIONS: The nations’ three leaders discussed China’s ‘dangerous and unlawful behavior in the South China Sea,’ and agreed on the importance of continued coordination Japan, the Philippines and the US vowed to further deepen cooperation under a trilateral arrangement in the face of rising tensions in Asia’s waters, the three nations said following a call among their leaders. Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr and outgoing US President Joe Biden met via videoconference on Monday morning. Marcos’ communications office said the leaders “agreed to enhance and deepen economic, maritime and technology cooperation.” The call followed a first-of-its-kind summit meeting of Marcos, Biden and then-Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida in Washington in April last year that led to a vow to uphold international
RSS