By Tim Waggoner
LONDON, October 29, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Selecting the sex of one’s baby is a trend that is becoming increasingly popular among U.K. couples, but in order to procure the procedure couples are often being flown to illegal foreign destination, reports a BBC reporter.
After researching sex selection and discovering how many U.K. couples are illegally choosing the sex of their babies in foreign countries, BBC’s Collete McBeth took a hidden camera into a meeting with a representative from a Turkish fertility clinic she had seen advertised on a sex selection website.
The Jinemed Center had set up shop in London for a few days in order to secure new clients. They would then fly their clients to Istanbul, where both in-vitro fertilisation and Pre-Implantation Genetic Diagnosis (PGD) are performed so that the couples can choose the sex of their baby. PGD, a type of embryo screening, is illegal in the U.K. except for mothers who are susceptible to their babies having gender related genetic diseases.
The video (https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7696698.stm) shows a Jinemed representative guaranteeing to McBeth and her husband, who posed as potential clients, that she would bear a child with the gender of their choosing. He also agreed that they should not spread around the news that they had done so as Jinemed could get in trouble – gender selection is also illegal in Turkey.
It was also mentioned that Jinemed usually implants three embryos into the women, with the extra fetuses being “taken out” later – that is, aborted.
The Jinemed center has responded to the allegations regarding the video by saying they do not perform sex selection procedures and that they have always warned against implanting three embryos in a woman.
The Turkish government has launched a full investigation into the allegedly illegal undertakings of Jinemed and has warned U.K. couples not to obtain sex selection procedures in Turkey.
To read McBeth’s firsthand report, see:
https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7696698.stm