Israel, Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Israelis stranded in Georgia with baby born to surrogate Ukrainian refugee mother

Source YNET News

For the past two months, an Israeli couple has remained stranded in the country of Georgia with their baby born to a refugee of the ongoing war in Ukraine.

Sarit and Alex Haiman’s son was born on May 18 with the help of a Ukrainian surrogate mother, named Olga, who was extracted from the war torn country with her two children and smuggled into Georgia ahead of the birth.

Now that Olga has returned to Ukraine, the authorities are refusing to grant the baby a birth certificate due to being to born to a refugee, preventing the young family from leaving for Israel.

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Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Wartime labour: How Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has exposed the reality of the surrogacy industry

Source The Glove and Mail

Nurse Oksana Martynenko feeds a surrogate-born baby inside a special shelter owned by BioTexCom clinic in a residential basement, as Russia’s invasion continues, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine March 15, 2022. Picture taken March 15, 2022. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich
GLEB GARANICH/REUTERS

Among the most heartrending footage that has emerged from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been of the children.

They have suffered the misfortune of being born in what is now a warzone, and many have been orphaned, injured and killed by Russian violence. According to UNICEF, 7.1 million people have been internally displaced in Ukraine so far, including up to 2.8 million children; more than 4.5 million people, 90 per cent of whom are women and children, have been forced to flee the country altogether. An entire generation of Ukrainians now threatens to be hollowed out.

Yet for some in the West, the focus has been on a different category of Ukrainian children: the surrogate-born babies promised to foreign couples around the world.

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Surrogacy, UK, Ukraine, War

UK – ‘We took in our twins’ surrogate mum after she fled Ukraine. We couldn’t look our kids in the eye if we hadn’t’

Source My London

Maryna and her family arrived in London on April 24 (Image: Celia Niven)

She says this is the bare minimum she could do after her surrogate gave her the “greatest achievement” of her life.

A woman has taken in her twins’ surrogate and her family after they fled the war in Ukraine. For many, the relationship between a surrogate and the family is simply a financial transaction, but for Celia Niven, 41, and her husband Rob the bond they’ve created with their twins’ carrier is lifelong, and now they have been able to give back to her in an unimaginable way.

In 2017, after eight rounds of IVF and suffering many losses throughout the journey, the couple turned to a surrogacy clinic in Kyiv, Ukraine. Heartbreakingly, seven rounds of surrogacy, with different surrogate mothers, were either unsuccessful or ended in tragedy.

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Ireland, Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Ireland – FAMILY’S MOVE Rosanna says it’s ‘horrendous’ what’s happening to Ukrainians as surrogate settles in Ireland

Source The Sun

The Irish model said her surrogate Anastasia, and her family arrived in Ireland after a “harrowing and traumatic journey across Ukraine”.

The former Miss World and her husband Wes Quirke welcomed their eldest child, Sophia, through surrogacy in 2019.

The couple travelled to Ukraine to find a surrogate after suffering a heartbreaking 14 miscarriages during their fertility battle.

And they have now welcomed Anastasia her family and their husky dog into their home after Ukraine was devastated by Putin’s war.

The family were previously living in the besieged city of Kherson, which is under Russian control and took a small opportunity to leave after talk of a referendum.

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Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Ukraine surrogacy clinic delivers 80th wartime baby

Source The National News

A Ukraine surrogacy clinic has delivered its 80th wartime baby since Russia invaded the country two months ago.

BioTexCom has been caring for surrogate mothers and newborn babies in a bomb shelter and apartments next to its clinic in Ukraine’s capital Kyiv.

The company is working with volunteer medics, Warriors Without Borders, to deliver the children safely to their parents across the Polish border.

As it marked the 80th child born, it released a video of one of its surrogate mothers reassuring expectant foreign parents that they were safe.

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Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Surrogate mothers rescued from Ukrainian war zones as Russia-Ukraine battle continues

Source Fox News

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As the war between Russia and Ukraine nears its eighth week, Project DYNAMO is managing to continue with evacuation missions for groups of people who are most at risk.

Five surrogate mothers who are carrying children for American parents were among the 60 people the rescue organization recently evacuated. They’re currently staying in a “safe location” in Ukraine that has been code-named Club DYNAMO.

Russia, Surrogacy, War

Another suffering surrogacy hub: Russia

Source BioEdge

It is well known that the surrogacy industry in Ukraine is another victim of Russia’s invasion. Surrogate mothers are in danger; parents are unable to fetch the babies that they commissioned; babies are being sheltered in basements; everyone fears bombardment.

Less visible is the plight of the Russian surrogacy industry. In a revealing article in BioNews,

Christina Weis, of De Montfort University in the UK, and Maria Kirpichenko, a researcher at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, give a snapshot of how the war has affected surrogate mothers, parents and doctors in Russia.

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Surrogacy, UK, Ukraine, War

UK – My Ukrainian surrogate saved my life by giving me a baby – now it was my turn to save hers: The extraordinary story of one mother’s 2,300-mile mission to rescue the woman who’d made her dream of a family come true

Source Daily Mail

It is a bond that has united two families, spanned 2,300 miles and defied the most terrifying war machine the world has seen in generations. And this week, it culminated in a moving reunion.

For little Sophie was carried by Nazar’s mother Vita Lysenko, a surrogate from Ukraine, who two months ago gave Heather and Mark Easton the ‘mir

When the two women last saw each other, they thought it could be their final meeting. Using patchy Google Translate, they had promised to keep in touch.

Heather, 32, and HGV driver Mark, 39, were to return to Rugby, Warwickshire, with the child they had spent eight excruciating years and £80,000 to get. acle baby’ they had always longed for.

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Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Ukraine’s surrogate mothers trapped between the frontlines

Source DW

It’s a job you can’t quit: Carrying a child for other people. With the war raging in Ukraine, the country’s large surrogacy industry has unraveled, leaving both surrogate mothers and intended parents in limbo.

Camouflage-patterned sleeping bags, shelves stacked with cans, baby cribs side by side with gas masks. Shortly before the outbreak of the war, Ukraine’s largest surrogacy agency, BioTexCom, published a video on its website — a tour of an air-raid shelter, accompanied by the sound of wailing sirens, where Ukrainian surrogate mothers were supposed to find refuge in the event of war. The message was clear: The pregnant women and the children they carry would be looked after.

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Surrogacy, Surrogate Mother, Ukraine, War

Ukraine war: Couple’s bid to make safe home for surrogate mother

Source BBC

Heather Easton (right) has built a close friendship with Vita Lysenko

A couple are trying to give the Ukrainian surrogate mother of their baby a safe home in the UK.

Heather and Mark Easton, from Rugby, Warwickshire, returned from Kyiv with baby Sophie two weeks before Russia invaded the country.

They have found a sponsor for Vita Lysenko and her family who fled to Belgium last week.

But the family do not have passports and have found getting visas “extremely difficult”, Mrs Easton said.

After having a hysterectomy Mrs Easton decided to use a surrogate to have a child.

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Ireland, Law, Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Irish surrogacy in Ukraine: What does the Russian invasion mean?

Source News Talk

Mary Seery-Kearney says the woman who gives birth to the child remains the child’s legal mother

Author Jack Quaan

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has not changed the legal status of surrogate children born to Irish parents.

That’s according to Fine Gael Senator Mary Seery-Kearney – who says regardless of where a child is born, the mother who gives birth to the child remains the child’s legal mother.

It comes amid concerns whether some surrogacy contracts may have been changed if surrogate mothers were to give birth outside of Ukraine.

“The agreement was based on an agreement that is recognised in Ukrainian law, and subject to Ukrainian law, and based on the baby being born in Ukraine.

“When the couple would come home to Ireland, they have to apply to the court in order to get the parental order for the father – because we don’t have surrogacy legislation in Ireland

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Surrogacy, War

International surrogacy law: existing conflicts unresolved

Source Bio News UK

The current conflict in Ukraine has drawn into sharp focus the myriad of problems that international surrogacy can throw up. Very little looks certain for the children, surrogates, and intended parents affected by the conflict in Ukraine, other than the fact that difficult practical and legal questions will hang over these families for months and years to come.

Differences between jurisdictions in the laws surrounding surrogacy arrangements have caused problems for families for years, as the recent international surrogacy law case of Re X,Y and Z (Children: Parental Orders: Time Limit) [2022] demonstrates. The case, which straddled multiple jurisdictions – California and Oregon in the USA, Denmark, and the UK – clearly highlights the ongoing vulnerability of surrogate-born children with questions over their legal parentage. It also brings into close focus the need for law reform to stop more surrogate born children and their intended parents falling victim to complex international conflicts of law.

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Ukraine, War

How Russia’s invasion is affecting Ukraine’s surrogacy industry, leaving intended families ‘desperate for assistance’

Source Yahoo.com

Russia’s attack on Ukraine is affecting the thriving surrogacy industry there, leaving intended parents in the U.S. and other countries in limbo. (Photo: Getty Images)

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is creating ripple effects felt around the globe, from soaring gas prices to fears of a potential nuclear war. But a less-obvious industry being affected by the war is surrogacy — a thriving business in Ukraine.

That’s never been more apparent as headline after headline shows couples from the U.S. and other countries fleeing Ukraine with their newborn babies. Dr. Jessie Boeckmann, an ophthalmologist in Costa Mesa, Calif., and her husband Jacob shared on Instagram that they escaped with their 4-day old baby, born from a Ukrainian surrogate, enduring a 27-hour taxi ride by a kind driver and eventually having to walk seven miles to reach the Ukrainian-Polish border. (Boeckmann did not respond to Yahoo Life’s interview request.)

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Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

‘Will the babies be left in a war zone?’ The terrified Ukrainian surrogates – and the parents waiting for their children

Source The Guardian

Since Russian tanks began rolling over the Ukrainian border, the international media have reported on the plight of foreign couples using paid Ukrainian surrogate mothers. Usually, these articles make scant reference to the surrogates’ wellbeing, instead being written up as breathless tales of derring-do, as plucky couples launch daring raids to bring their babies to safety.

The Irish Independent, for example, reported on a County Kerry couple who had brought their son back from Ukraine without making any reference to their surrogate, presumably left postpartum in a war zone. Sometimes, the couples appear indifferent to the plight of the women left behind: one American parent recently wrote a 1,257-word Instagram post about getting her newborn out of Ukraine in which she thanked her gym for keeping her “fit enough” to make the journey and the travel agent who had arranged her hotel, but did not make any reference to the woman who had carried her baby.

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Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

After dramatic rescue mission, Chicago couple meets premature twins born via surrogacy in Ukraine

Source ABC Chicago

Twin Ukrainian boys who were born via surrogacy shortly after Russia began its attack in the country have been safely evacuated to Poland.

The twins’ father, Alexander Spektor, who lives in Chicago with the boys’ mother, Irma Nuñez, was able to meet his sons for the first time after their rescue Monday. The boys were born 10 days premature on Feb. 25.

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Ireland, Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Four Irish babies born to Ukrainian surrogates in Kyiv hospital – Tánaiste

Source Irish Times

Ukraine is a popular location for Irish couples seeking to have babies via surrogate mothers. Photograph: iStock

There are four Irish babies newly born to surrogate Ukrainian mothers in a maternity hospital in the country’s capital Kyiv, Tánaiste Leo Varadkar has said.

Mr Varadkar disclosed details about the previously unknown number of babies in Ukraine while making the case against the expulsion of Russia’s ambassador to Ireland Yuriy Filatov.

The Fine Gael leader was speaking about the need to maintain relations with Russia despite growing public and political calls for Mr Filatov’s expulsion over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

“There are four babies in the Ukraine at the moment in a maternity hospital in Kyiv and that hospital could be under Russian occupation within weeks. We need to be able to talk to the Russians,” he told RTÉ’s News at One.

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Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Premature Twins Born To Surrogate Mother In Ukraine Stranded In War-Torn City

Source LA Times

Two premature twin babies born from a surrogate have been stuck in Ukraine since the conflict began, as parents Alex Spektor and Irma Nuñez attempt to find ways to keep their children safe. This is a representational image. Christian Bowen/Unsplash.

As the Russia-Ukraine conflict continues to escalate into an all-out war, the surrogate baby industry in Ukraine is under attack as the safety of the babies born and the surrogates who give birth to the infants are put into question on Tuesday, March 1.

Alex Spektor and Irma Nuñez, who live in the state of Georgia in the U.S., found themselves worrying for their newborn children after their surrogate in Ukraine gave birth to the babies prematurely at 32 weeks in Kyiv last week, according to Today.

The twin boys, Lenny and Moishe Spektor, are currently being cared for by the surrogate and a pediatrician in Kyiv. However, Spektor and Nuñez are worried for their safety as they look for possible hospitals in the country that has a bomb shelter to ensure the children’s safety, the New York Post reported.

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Surrogacy, UK, Ukraine, War

British couple’s ‘absolute nightmare’ stranded in Ukraine while collecting newborn surrogate twins

Source Independent

A British couple are stuck in a “living nightmare” after they travelled to Kyiv to collect their surrogate-born twins and found themselves stranded in the middle of a war.

Manisha and Metaish Parmar arrived in Ukraine three weeks ago as the surrogate mother gave birth to the babies they had been waiting for for 13 years.

They are now stranded in an apartment in Kyiv with their newborns and Mr Parmar’s parents amid Russia’s invasion, and run for shelter together in a bunker when the air raid sirens go off.

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Surrogacy, Ukraine, War

Surrogacy has Argentine families stranded due to Ukrainian crisis

Source Merco Press

At least five Argentine couples who had sought to have children through surrogate Ukrainian mothers are among those currently stranded in the war-torn country, it was reported.

They are also having troubles accessing air-raid shelters.

Ukraine is one of the few countries in the world that allows couples to access surrogacy and thus fulfill the dream of becoming parents. Dozens of Argentines and citizens from other parts of the world travel there every year for that purpose.

“They are telling us to leave Ukrainian territory. It was all very sudden and we have to organize ourselves. The issue is that we do not know how to go about that,” an Argentine mother has been quoted by Télam as saying.

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