Right: an Indian women's rights group, the Centre for Social Research, claims that use of gender selection in the country is widespread, due to the national preference for male children.
Further implications
It is probable that the National Health and Medical Research Councils Ethical guidelines on the use of assisted reproductive technology in clinical practice and research will be reviewed this year.
The relatively ready availability of IVF procedures for sex selection in Thailand and elsewhere may lead the Council to conclude that it should make the procedure available for this purpose in Australia. Were the Council to make this recommendation it would give it the power to establish regulations limiting the conditions under which this procedure would be allowed for gender selection. However, even where the Council to do this, those couples whose circumstances did not fit any revised NHMRC guidelines would still be able to have the procedure performed overseas.
There seems little political will to make any legislative change. Both the federal healthy minister and the leader of the Opposition have indicated they are opposed to any relaxation of the guidelines. It is also the case that a large majority of the electorate are opposed to IVF procedures being used for sex selection. Popular opposition to the practice appears to have been one of the determining factors in the recent decision of the British Government to continue to disallow the practice.
Regulations aside, it is the will of couples to use the technology for this purpose that is likely to determine what occurs in the long-term. Currently only a small percentage of couples asks to be able to select the gender of their child and an even smaller group is prepared to go overseas to access the procedure. However, as the cost of having the procedure performed in Thailand is now so relatively low, this trend may well increase.
A survey taken among British couples using IVF indicated that some 40 percent would like to be able to select the sex of their children. If preference levels are as high as this in Australia then the number of couples going off-shore to access the procedure will grow.