Australian couple refuse Down baby from surrogate mother
Bangkok Post opens today with a major article about Gammy, a six-month-old baby born by a Thai surrogate mother and abandoned by Australian parents because he suffers from Down syndrome. His twin sister has been taken to Australia.
In addition to Down syndrome, the child also suffers from a potentially life-threatening heart defect. The child will have to undergo several surgeries in the coming years to correct it.
The Australian Charity Organization Hands Across the Water has stepped into the breach for Gammy. She saw a chance with the Hope for Gammy page on the internet to collect an amount of 5 million baht within a day, more than enough for the operations that will cost more than 750.000 baht in total. The counter shot up after the Australian media paid attention to the case.
The surrogate mother was promised 350.000 baht for her work and another 50.000 baht when it turned out that she was carrying twins. When it turned out that the boy had Down syndrome, the biological parents wanted to terminate the pregnancy, but she refused on religious grounds. In the end, she received 70.000 baht less than the agreed amount from the agency that had mediated. The woman has promised to raise Grammy as her own child.
The Department of Health Service Support discussed the matter in a meeting on Wednesday. Changes to the rules regarding IVF have been discussed. The proposed changes include a ban on commercial surrogacy, which would affect "thousands of people" who come to Thailand each year to take advantage of it. It is estimated that 200 couples come from Australia alone each year.
(Source: Bangkok Post, August 3, 2014)
People only show their true values in difficult times. That promises something for the Australian couple. I actually feel sorry for the twin sister. And I detest that spineless Australian couple. All credit to the surrogate mother.
I fully support this comment from Nick.
I can make no more of it.
This is also big news in the Netherlands. But I still want to hear the story of the Australian couple.
Fortunately, the boy is receiving good care because a lot of money has already been collected. Sometimes you need to hear both sides of a story.
@ Christina It is good practice in the (better) media to highlight a story from both sides. I assume that the Australian media have tried or are trying to let the couple speak. It is possible that he avoids contact with the media, which I can accept, because media can be merciless. We call this Lynch journalism.
Hypocrisy at its best, accepting the healthy part of the twin and not the other.
But yes, the full story can also be different. Some reservations in this regard seem appropriate.
Some reservations are clearly indicated as it becomes a business agreement in this way.
One can also look at it soberly from this side and say if it needs help we can take good care of it and what if we are no longer there, what then?
I think it is very easy to shout or say something about other people's things.
Why was the surrogate mother tested? She did it for the money because she was in debt.
Still, I'll stick with it, let the other people speak too, if possible. If it is perhaps as described, they will soon have something to explain to their daughter. She may not want to be their daughter anymore. It is a delicate matter and again the children are the victims of this.
In the event that an unborn baby is not healthy and will be born with serious abnormalities, the options are discussed with the parents in 'Western' countries. One of them is to terminate the pregnancy. The last word is with the parents and not with the doctors, I know from my own experience. After all, they are responsible for what happens to their unborn, or later to their born baby. In Western countries, too, there are people who object to having an abortion.
In this case, the Australian parents (the sperm and egg came from the man and the woman, respectively, according to the news reports) preferred to terminate the pregnancy. The surrogate mother did not want this and gave birth to two children: one healthy, the other with a life-threatening defect.
I don't know if there are conditions in the contract of surrogacy to provide a solution in this kind of situation. Because this concerns acts that are still permitted in Thailand and surrogacy by Thai women apparently occurs much more often, I can hardly imagine that no conditions have been set for this kind of situation. The question now is which party (the parents or the surrogate mother) has violated one or more conditions.
Be that as it may, I think it's a disgraceful course of action! A Thai woman is essentially left to fend for herself by an Australian couple who just wanted to “buy” a “perfect product”.
Just like the amount the Thai surrogate mother received. 330.000 Thai Baht is outrageously low!!!
There was a reason why those Australians couldn't have children naturally. And lynch journalism?
Such behavior is clearly asking for it. Apparently the contract wasn't so 'watertight' after all...