In the present Covid-19 pandemic situation, intended parents, surrogates, and surrogate born children are facing problems because of the restriction of international traveling and logistical difficulties. Many countries have halted fertility treatment due to the uncertainties that arrive after the COVID-19 attack. Surrogacy arrangements become more critical because of wider legislative issues embark on the path of this journey.
Nowadays, surrogacy is on-demand fertility treatment due to the increasing rate of infertility as well as non-traditional family building trends. But this is a time taking procedure and COVID 19 creates an additional delay in the whole process.
This qualm brings anxiety, financial pressure, legal complexity, and practical issues for intended parents. Intended parents often face emotional trauma when they have to travel within a specific time period due to the birth of their surrogate child or return back to their home country after the delivery of the child/ children. Therefore, during COVID-19, surrogacy requires extra care to save the newborn.
And for this, every stakeholder involves in surrogacy including surrogacy agency, fertility clinicians, egg donation bank, surrogates, intended parents, healthcare professionals, and immigration lawyers require to be more creative to deal with the problems arise during this journey.
Across the globe, a variety of legal and wider issues arise for surrogates, intended parents, and surrogate born children. Some of the common issues are as follows:
- Intended parents who are seeking to travel to the selected surrogacy destination for their surrogate child/children will be born have faced logistical difficulties.
- Intended parents’ are restricted or prevented to attend the born of their surrogate child due to restricted hospital policy.
- In many surrogacy destination countries like the UK, intended parents’ do not allow them to provide personally assume care to their born surrogate child.
- Difficulty to obtain the legal parental authority of a surrogate born child.
- Difficulty obtaining a passport and other require papers of the surrogate born child which are necessary to travel back to their home country.
- Health and welfare-related concerns of surrogate or an unborn surrogate child have increased during the Covid-19 crisis.
- Uncertainty and delay in establishing and accessing fertility treatment to the surrogates.
- Ambiguity and interruption in a surrogacy arrangement.
- Both intended parents and surrogates facing difficulty to meet with each other during these changing circumstances.
- During the Covid-19 pandemic, surrogate, agency, or a fertility clinic is facing difficulty to come to streamline to perform their functioning.
- Difficulty in the availability of a surrogate or donor during the Covid-19 crisis makes the surrogacy uncertain.
- The increased rate of death during the Covid-19 pandemic creates a fearful atmosphere. In addition, clinics facing crises for facilities required proper storage and use of eggs, sperm, and embryos in a surrogacy and fertility treatment setting.
Intended parents need to contact a surrogacy agency if they unable to reach timely in the country where their surrogate child will bear, then they need for arranging an emergency guardian on the host country and systematize all the documents for temporary guardianship to provide appropriate care for their born child.
Intended parents usually apply for a parental order, but in the current situation delay in processing is a common issue. In such a condition, the court will take any critical decision in respect of the child’s favor.
In Covid-19, legal works delays due to a limited number of lawyers. In such a condition, the surrogacy agency needs to consult with the children’s welfare committee to take part in care for surrogates and a born child. To handle the present condition, the unenforceability of the parental order conditions may minimize the impact of Covid-19 for intended parents.
References:
- https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-53040442
Ravi Sharma is a self-motivated, successful entrepreneur and has a solid experience in the fertility segment. and he is the director at ARTbaby Global (ARThealthcare). He is a pharmacy graduate with post-graduation in business administration and has 14 years of rich experience in the field of infertility segment. He loves to write about IVF, Surrogacy, and other ART (assisted reproductive technology) news, issues, and updates. He is a Pharmacy graduate (B. Pharm) and M.B.A (marketing).
His most recent success includes the successful launch of the medical tourism company, ARTbaby, which offers treatment options for infertility, egg donation, and surrogacy. He likes spending time with his family and writing about various aspects of IVF surrogacy and donating eggs.