The presenter and actress has become a mother by surrogate pregnancy at the age of 68
Specialists in bioethics, law and equality analyze if it is legitimate to pay for a pregnancy and if there is an age to breed
The scene could not have ignited the fuse with more fury. As everyone by now will have seen, the ‘Hello!’ magazine has arrived this Wednesday with an image of Ana Obregono, of 68 yearsleaving a Miami clinic in Wheelchairas established by the maternal protocol, and a baby in arms: his daughter, born by surrogacy. The choreography, shocking at best, has set off a lot of pertinent debates, most of them on fire, regarding a/the realities that are often hidden in such a neat and neutral term as ‘surrogacy’, b/yes There really is a responsible age for raising children and c/to what extent does money place you in a bubble of access, even to practices prohibited in Spain, such as hiring a woman to gestate and give birth.
Beyond the Minister of Equality, Irene Montero, who has described this method as “violence against women”, specialists in bioethics and equality also point to the problematic reality of surrogacy. In advertisements and reports that usually appear in the media, pregnant women from wealthy positions often speak who have given birth to children almost out of solidarity. But the general consensus insists on the evidence that with these specific cases an industry as powerful as that of surrogate motherhood in the US could not be built, where each process can cost between 120,000 and 200,000 euros. The reality, the specialists point out, is that pregnant women are usually precarious women who agree to go through the process -some US companies even put a GPS bracelet on them to keep them under control- because they need the money to move forward. To what extent is this process legitimate then? Are the rights of all parties secured? Are there situations in which third parties can be managed while respecting ethical barometers?
Is it legitimate to pay for a pregnancy?
“In Spain these contracts are void, because they imply a lack of protection for minors, profit for agencies and exploitation for women,” recalls Itziar Lecuona, from the Bioethics and Law Observatory of the University of Barcelona. “The term surrogate pregnancy is a euphemism that eliminates all the human elements of a pregnancy. In addition, in many cases it is offered as another assisted reproduction technique, with which we do not agree,” adds this specialist in Law and Bioethics. “Substitution gestation produces an instrumentalization or objectification of women -adds the specialist- and not every human relationship can be absorbed by the dynamics of the market, since the autonomy of women who offer to gestate is also highly questionable” when These decisions are linked in most cases to economic needs.
contracts
Vanesa Rodríguez, from the Stop Belly Rental platform, gives some details of the contracts in the US: “You do not pay for the process, but for the ‘product’, without a child, the payment is not made, so they become pregnancies highly medicalized -assures Rodríguez- Many tests are carried out, deliveries are usually scheduled -a collection date is established- and medical treatment -such as hormones, which facilitates pregnancy- is prescribed to women who do not need it for their own health, which is highly questionable from a medical ethics point of view.
And beyond market practices, are there cases in which it could be considered that a woman gestate a child for other people? According to a letter from the Bioethics Observatory of the UB, if necessary, it would have to be under judicial control, free of charge and that “The pregnant woman could revoke her consent at any time during the process, up to a few weeks after the birth”. Isabel Muntané, specialist in equality and coordinator of the Master in Gender and Communication at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, goes a little further. “Equally, we should begin to ask ourselves if, given that reality exists, this type of situation can be regulated from an ethical point of view so that precarious women are not left unprotected, in addition to promoting decisive measures against female poverty, which is the key to this whole thing.”
Is there an age to breed?
Vanesa Rodríguez remembers that, although she was the cover of ‘Hello!’ of Ana Obregón, the one who has brought surrogacy to the ‘timeline’ of the day, the majority of clients in this market are heterosexual couples having trouble conceiving. However, it is true that the Obregón case raises some questions about whether there is an age for childbearing and why, beyond surrogacy, the age that is criticized in mothers is often treated as a trophy -there they are from Mick Jagger to Richard Gere- in the case of parents.
women and age
“Women are always more watched, care responsibility is still placed on us of the creatures and we are criticized if we do not give birth between the ages of 25 and 35 -says Isabel Muntané-. However, I do believe that motherhood is not a right and that, both in the case of women and men, there is an age to raise children, because children have the right to have parents with physical and emotional capacity “.
For the sociologist Marina Subirats, having a child at 68, be it a man or a woman, is “real nonsense.” “The vital horizon of the creature is to have a dependent father or mother in a few years,” says Subirats, who considers that too often we are “prostituting the word freedom.”
And here we touch bones, because one of the realities that the Obregón case underscores is that, with money, one can go to the United States, hire a pregnant woman -something that cannot be done in Spain- and return with a child that Finally, he will be able to register in the Civil Registry, surely to alleviate the grieving process that, according to psychologists consulted, he has not been able to or has not been able to do.
And although the ‘Hello!’ speaks with an epic of the case that is at least shocking – “the girl who has restored the joy of living”, “the 180 degree turn”, “the judo key to fatality” -, for Altell the motherhood of Obregón it throws up some pertinent questions about who pays for the wishes of the privileged classes, while adding to the widespread idea that “money can really buy everything.” “It is reprehensible that everything can be for sale, including uteruses,” questions Marina Subirats. to interfere in that decision?”