Surrogacy is an arrangement in which a woman carries a child in her womb for other couple or parent. There are millions of couples in this world who are together unable to give birth to their successor. There can be many medical or social conditions for this, like low sperm count, damage of lining of uterus, women with absent uterus, poor endometrium lining, or women with repeated IVF failures or in situations where both the parents are of same sex. Since surrogacy was discovered, it has proved to a big boon for many childless couples all over the world. Few religions may have problem with the procedure of traditional surrogacy, so concerned couples should consult an expert in this domain which might help them with Gestational surrogacy.
There are six types of surrogacy methods, which involves single or both the parents, depending on the situation. Women carrying the womb on behalf of others is known as ‘surrogate mother’, while the real parents who intend to have a child are known as ‘Intended parents’.
This involves naturally or artificially inseminating a surrogate mother with the intended father's sperm via intra uterine insemination (IUI), IVF or home insemination. Using this method, the child is genetically related to its father and the surrogate mother.
A surrogate mother is artificially inseminated with donor sperm via IUI or IVF or home insemination. The infant born is genetically related to the surrogate mother and sperm donor.
When the intended mother is not able to carry a baby to term due to diabetes, hysterectomy, cancer, etc., her egg and the intended father's sperm are used to create an embryo (via IVF) that is transferred into surrogate mother and is carried by her. The child is genetically related to its parents while the surrogate mother has no genetic relationship with him.
If there is no intended mother or the intended mother is unable to produce eggs, the surrogate mother carries the embryo developed from a donor egg that has been fertilized by sperm from the intended father. With this method, the child born is genetically related to the intended father and the surrogate mother has no genetic relationship.
If there is no intended father or the intended father is unable to produce sperm, the surrogate mother carries an embryo developed from the egg of the intended mother and donor sperm. With this method, the resulting child is genetically related to the intended mother and the surrogate mother has no genetic relationship.
When the intended parents are unable to produce either sperm, egg, or embryo, the surrogate mother can carry a donated embryo . The child born has genetically no relation with the intended parents, or with the surrogate mother.
Now in India, Surrogacy is legal and many Health care centres have been opened across the country. These centres either have their own donors or have their contract with agencies which provide them with surrogate mothers.