Source: NewsByte
Ukraine is in news again but for reasons apolitical. The European nation has become the go-to place for people wanting to have children via surrogacy.
Despite regional, cultural and bureaucratic barriers, what unites prospective parents and surrogate mothers is desperate need. One party needs a child, the other, money.
Here, we look at how surrogacy is making a few dreams come true in Ukraine.
Source: The Witachee Times
SPOKANE —Surrogate mothers could be paid for carrying a child for another couple under a bill that passed the Senate despite criticism that it could turn babies into “commodities like a bushel of wheat or widgets.”
Source: Times of India
Every couple hopes to hear their child giggling in the house, but sometimes their dream seems to slowly fade to a point that it starts to feel far-fetched. Science is offering many Assisted Reproductive Techniques but seldom medical issues with the couple obstruct the way, even after options like IVF, IUI, and ICSI etc. When these techniques fail, a couple has two final options left: Adoption and Surrogacy.
Source: Euractiv
Sophia Kuby is the director of EU advocacy at ADF International.
Surrogacy agencies, clinics, lawyers, and medical doctors cash in on the business of selling sperm and egg cells, creating embryos in vitro, implanting them into a woman’s hired womb and providing the “commissioning parents” with a baby.
The Hague Conference on Private International Law, an intergovernmental institution comprising 82 members, including all EU member states and the EU itself, has stepped into the ethical and legal quagmire created by this business.
Source: Greenwich Time
GREENWICH — When Wear Culvahouse, a Greenwich obstetrician-gynecologist, delivered a baby for the first male same-sex parents at Greenwich Hospital in 2004, he saw doors opening for himself as well.
The team assembled to to help the male couple included personnel from labor and delivery, the nursery and administration. They set up two rooms at Greenwich Hospital: One for the new fathers to learn how to bathe, feed and change their baby, and one for their surrogate to recover.
Source: St George News
With the issue now before the Utah Supreme Court of whether or not gay men should have the right to the same legal protections in surrogate birth arrangements as others have under Utah law, one senator wants to end those protections, at least for now, for all couples in order to keep a promise he made 13 years ago.
Sen. Lyle Hillyard, R-Logan, is seeking to pass a bill that would end legal protections for surrogate births | Profile photo via senate.utah.gov, St. George News Sen. Lyle Hillyard, R-Logan, is sponsoring a bill, designated SB 126, that would repeal Utah law on gestational agreements, law that came from a bill he sponsored in 2005.
Source: The Globe and Mail
A year ago, after their surrogate’s labour through the night, Globe business reporter Tim Kiladze, left, and his husband, Matt, finally got to meet their daughter Eva. Tim took 10 months of parental leave to care for the baby .
I tried my very best to be calm, convincing myself that everything before this, all the agony and the ecstasy in my life, had been preparation for this moment.
Source: Pink News
Surrogacy is becoming an increasingly popular way for couples to have children, but the process varies around the world and where to start can be a challenge for some parents.
Well look no further – this event has all the information you need to get started on the process of starting your family with surrogacy.
In reality, surrogacy is as old as the Bible, but despite its rich history, parents-to-be and surrogates are both in need of a lot of support from the beginning of their journey.
Source: EBN
A roughly 10% spike in employer-offered fertility benefits is expected in the next two years as more companies evaluate and prioritize family-friendly benefits in an effort to attract and retain top talent.
New research out by Willis Towers Watson reveals the percentage of employers offering fertility benefits to employees is expected to grow from 55% in 2017 to 66% by 2019. And, of employers already offering financial assistance, 81% said the benefits would apply to same-sex couples next year, compared with 65% in 2017.
Source ITV
A woman from Rotherham who has been a surrogate mother twice – is calling for urgent changes to what they believe to be outdated surrogacy law.
When Kate became pregnant she always intended to give the child to its parents, Tracy and Pete from Portsmouth.
But, under UK law she could have changed her mind at any point and kept the baby as her own, because she gave birth to the child
Source: Stuff NZ
A married same-sex couple who advertised in The Dominion Post for a Māori egg donor have found one – and are now searching for a surrogate.
About 60 Māori women offered to help after Baden and Nelson Marino-Hall, who live in Toowoomba, Queensland, sought a donor in July last year.
They settled on one, who lives in Australia, and now have six donated embryos on ice.
Source: NDTV.com
New Delhi: Central government’s women employees, whose children are born through surrogacy, will now be entitled to maternity leave, according to an official order of the personnel ministry.
The employees can avail of paid maternity leaves up to 26 weeks (about 180 days).
The ministry has written to all central government departments about a 2015 Delhi High Court order on this issue.
Source: The Salt Lake Tribune
Sen. Lyle Hillyard sat in his chair as Lisa Candie Barlow asked him not to repeal the law that provides her legal protections while she carries her brother’s child.
Barlow is 14 weeks pregnant with a baby that she’ll give back to her brother upon delivery.
She was one of dozens of mothers, fathers and surrogates – including Abby Cox, who is married to Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox – who pleaded with a committee on Wednesday to block Hillyard’s SB126.
Source: Times of India
NEW DELHI: The department of personnel and training (DoPT) has instructed all Central ministries and departments to implement a 2015 order of the Delhi High Court for granting maternity leave to female employees who chooses to have a child by commissioning a surrogacy. Such leave would include both the pre-natal and post-natal period.
Source: Hello Giggles
While still not often discussed, fertility issues affect so many women and families in our culture. And Kayla Jones, 29, knew conceiving would be impossible after receiving a partial hysterectomy as a teenager.
But while Kayla’s uterus was removed, her ovaries weren’t — meaning she could still potentially have a child that was biologically hers with the help of a gestational surrogate. And that’s where her mother-in-law, 50-year-old Patty Resecker, came in.
Source: New Jersey Law Journal
A committee of the New Jersey Legislature has recommended approval of a bill—identical to one previously vetoed—that would permit legally binding gestational carrier agreements.
Source: Vermont Business Magazine
The Vermont House today gave approval to H.562, a bill pertaining to parentage (link is external). In 2017, the Legislature created a study committee in response to the Vermont Supreme Court’s request to provide legislative recommendations to modernize Vermont’s parentage laws to recognize the changing nature of Vermont families. H.562 is the result of the Parentage Study Committee’s work.
Source: Glamour
On February 16, 2017, Cheryl Flynn of Fillmore, Utah, gave birth to a healthy baby boy—though the child’s parents lived across the country, in New Jersey. Flynn was their surrogate. A mother of three already, Flynn and the baby’s parents found each other through Reproductive Medicine Associates of New Jersey—which works with 80 to 100 gestational surrogates every year—and it went so well that Flynn plans to act as a surrogate for the same couple again as soon as she is able (her doctor at RMANJ, Rita Gulati, M.D., FACOG, explains that gestational surrogates have to wait a full 12 months after delivery before attempting another pregnancy). “I am wishing Cheryl and the intended parents anther smooth and successful journey,” Dr. Gulati told Glamour. “This is definitely an exciting time.” While Flynn did not discuss her fee, being a gestational surrogate can generate anywhere from $25,000 to $240,000 and up for the woman carrying the pregnancy. Here, Flynn tells us in her own words what it’s like to be a gestational surrogate.
Source: National
Thai nationals eligible to apply for board approval for assisted pregnancies in cases related to medical conditions.
To protect children born via surrogates and prevent problems similar to those that have made recent headlines, authorities have set up strict rules for couples who wished to have a child via surrogacy due to difficulty conceiving a child naturally, and those wishing to provide that service.
Source: Bismarck Tribune
Shannon Mouser and Seth Paskin, of Austin, Texas, have desperately been trying to have a child of their own.
The couple married in 2014 and immediately tried various methods to get pregnant, including vitro fertilization, which involves combining sperm and an egg outside of the body, and artificial insemination. For years, they had no luck.
