Right: China allows gender selection, along with some other Asian countries. This policy seems to have helped bring about the current situation of boys being born at almost twice the rate of girls.
Arguments in favour of Australian parents using IVF to select the gender of their children
1. Couples who want a child of a particular gender should not be denied the opportunity
It has been claimed that reproductive autonomy is a right that should only be limited if it impinges on the rights of others. This extends, it is claimed, to parents being allowed to choose the sex of their children. Supporters of using IVF for gender selection claim that it causes no harm to others and therefore the procedure should be available to those parents who want it, particularly if they are prepared to pay for it themselves.
It appears that a significant percentage of parents currently using IVF would appreciate the opportunity to choose their babys gender. A study conducted in Britain in 2005 found that many women treated at infertility clinics would say yes to a free option to choose their baby's sex, according to a new study.
Researchers found that 41 percent of women said they would take advantage of a free option to select the sex of their baby during infertility treatment, and half of those women would still opt to choose the sex of their baby if they had to pay for the opportunity.
A British mother who has already given birth to three boys has been reported claiming, I got sick of walking down the high street past BabyGap and seeing these delightful little girl outfits in the window and just getting this pang. This is an area of our lives that we can't influence unless we pay for it. Hmm, that doesn't sound very nice but
Dr Gary Harton, who runs a British fertility clinic, has stated, We get regular workaday folk. He's a cop. She's a schoolteacher. It's just very, very important to them. People will take out mortgages, they'll borrow from relatives. They'll do anything.
In an article published in The Daily Mail, April May Maple wrote, If available, no one would be forced into it, just like now parents have the option to learn the sex of the baby at the ultrasound or wait until the birth. Choosing the sex would be an elective procedure paid for by the parents. This decision being made available will only affect those that choose to take advantage of it. For those that disagree, they can simply choose not to participate. It is simply unfair to deprive parents that have no apprehensions about making the decision due to the religious or personal feelings of others.
This position has been summed up in About.coms entry on Gender Selection which states, Aside from the fact that parents have traditionally been given great discretion over their reproductive choices, the ability to aid the desires of couples who have strong preferences about the gender of their offspring is perhaps the strongest reason for allowing such work. Thus, it is arguable that unless there is demonstrable and substantial harm to others, then couples should be allowed to choose the gender of their offspring.
2. Choosing a child's gender may be in the best interests of that child
Supporters of parents right to use IVF to choose the gender of their children argue that it may well be in the interests of the children born to those parents.
It has been claimed that if a couple desperately want a child of a particular gender and give birth to a child of the opposite gender, that child may not be as welcomed or well-treated as is desirable.
Professor Gab Kovacs, an IVF pioneer, has stated, It might be in the interests of the child. If a couple so badly want a boy or a girl that they are prepared to go through IVF and gender selection then maybe, if they had the child naturally and it was the wrong gender it may not be looked after as well.
A similar point has been made by bio-ethicist Dr Leslie Cannold from the Centre for Gender and Medicine, who has stated, We may be creating a situation if we stop people from doing that [using IVF in Australia to select the gender of their child] because, say, they don't have enough money to travel [to a country where the procedure is legal], where they're having a child that they're actually not going to be a very good parent to, and this doesn't seem a very good outcome either.
In an article published in The Daily Mail, April May Maple wrote, Look at the drastically different lives a child would lead having been born to parents that wanted the opposite sex compared to being born to parents that finally had the son or daughter they coveted. The parents and the child would be happier.
April Maple went on to state, Many families are larger than the parents originally intended, because they could not give up on their attempts of producing the son or daughter they sought after. Having a large family can be financially taxing, as well as very stressful for the parents and children.
3. Allowing Australian parents to select the gender of their child will not lead to discrimination and gender imbalances
It has been argued that the sort of gender imbalances that have occurred in China and India would not occur in Australia as there is not the same entrenched preference for a male child over a female. Such prejudices are reinforced by cultural traditions such as inheritance and dowry practices which are not a factor in Australia.
Making a similar point in relation to the United States, Dr Louise King nbsp; nbsp;noted, Those who favor sex selection for non-medical purposes correctly point to differences between Western and Eastern culture. In India, a daughter's dowry can bankrupt a family. No such burden exists in Western culture.
A similar point has been made by nbsp; . in an article published in the Medical Journal of Australia in 1999, Julian Savulescu, argued, Sex selection is more likely to harm women in Asia. There, sex selection is already common. The male-to-female ratio has risen to close to 1.2 in China and some urban parts of India.
It has been pointed out that in Western societies, those parents wishing to determine the sex of one of their children usually do so because they wish to balance their family. This means they already have one or more children of one gender and would like to have a child of the opposite gender. It is argued that such a desire does not represent a bias against one sex over another and would not result in gender imbalances across the country.
J S has noted, In the US, 90% of couples wanting sex selection wished to balance sex within the family. Parents were in their mid thirties, had two or three children and only wanted one more. In both the US and UK, just over half of couples choose a girl. Sex selection for family balancing would prevent, rather than contribute to, a disturbed sex ratio and harm to women.
Similarly Dr Louise King pointed out, The vast majority of couples surveyed [within the United States] who would seek ART for sex selection would do so to ensure a "balanced family" with a child of each sex. Israel permits sex selection for couples who have had four children of one sex and wish the next child to be of the other sex. Implicit in this policy is the argument that such a desire is not inherently sexist but merely recognizes that raising a girl is different from raising a boy.
4. Gender selection should be regulated not banned
It has been argued that the most extreme action governments are entitled to take is to regulate the use of IVF for sex selection. As gender selection is not intrinsically harmful, it is claimed that it is not reasonable to prohibit the practice. All governments should do is regulate the nature of access to the procedure to ensure that no individuals are disadvantaged.
In 2003, the British Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) issued a consultation paper on gender selection. The purpose of the consultation, entitled Sex selection: choice and responsibility in human reproduction, was to seek the views of the public regarding under which circumstances, if any, gender selection should be available to those seeking treatment and whether any new legal provisions should be put in place to regulate the practice. The Authority noted, The state should not prevent gender selection but only regulate it, to ensure that standards of public health and safety are maintained and that selection is carried out in a way which complies with the reasons for which it is permitted.
The Authority went on to state, In contemplating regulation, it should be noted that the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990 states that treatment should not be provided until account is taken of the welfare of the resulting child and any other child.
It has been argued that Australian state and federal governments should adopt a similar position, allowing IVF to be used for gender selection and regulating it only to the extent that this is necessary to prevent harm being done any of the parties involved.
5. Highly determined couples will find a means to select their childs gender
It has been argued that the prohibitions that exist in Australia are futile as those couples who can afford to do so go to other countries such as Thailand or the United States where they are able to use IVF techniques in order to have a child with the gender of their choice.
Dr Richard Henshaw, who runs a fertility clinic in Adelaide has stated, It's not like patients don't have an option; it's just that option is not available in Australia.
Doctors at a Thai fertility clinic at Phuket International Hospital claim they received dozens of inquiries from Australian parents in the first five days after the story about the Melbourne couple appeared in the Australian media.
The fertility clinic at the Phuket International Hospital gives prospective parents the option of choosing their baby's sex as well as having the embryo genetically engineered to remove the risk of hereditary diseases, such as Down syndrome. The total cost of the procedure, include airfare, is currently $8000. The same procedure is about twice as expensive in Australia. This means that the procedure is well within the reach of many parents seeking to select the gender of their child.
People from those countries where this procedure is banned can quite legally come to Thailand for the treatment, without breaking any laws in their home country, clinic chief obstetrician and gynaecologist, Dr Manop Janthanaphan has claimed.
The $7 million Safe Fertility Centre, which opened in October 2010, features the latest technology and specialised treatment labs for embryology, andrology, cryopreservation and genetics. The clinic expects to treat hundreds of childless couples from around the world each year, including dozens of couples from Australia.