Infertile Japanese couples desperate for children are looking across the Pacific for help, to American surrogate mothers.
Some Japanese couples are willing to spend up to $75,000 for a foreigner to carry their baby. The subject has attracted public interest and prompted debate on whether the procedure should be allowed in Japan.It is a particularly sensitive issue in this ethnically homogeneous society, where mixed-race marriages are frowned upon and infertility is considered a shameful physical handicap.
Clients at Tokyo's only advertised surrogate service fiercely guard their anonymity and have demanded only Asian-American surrogates.
"They're paranoid," said Yuki Sumi, director of the Tokyo branch of the Infertility Center of New York. She said some clients have even asked that the group's letterhead be removed from documents sent to them.
"Japanese couples don't want to hire white women with blonde hair, or blacks," in order to make sure the child does not stand out, she said.
Sumi said she had matched three couples with Asian-American surrogates since October and that two other couples were awaiting selection of surrogate mothers. So far, no babies have been born.
Noel Keane of Dearborn, Mich., a lawyer who founded the Infertility Center 17 years ago, said its clinics in Larkspur, Calif., New York City and Indianapolis have recorded 420 births and 32 current pregnancies.
A surrogate mother typically is implanted with a fertilized egg from a couple who cannot conceive naturally.
When the wife cannot produce an egg or it is not healthy enough, however, the surrogate's egg is used. Because of that possibility, Japanese couples insist on Asian-American surrogates.
Although the Infertility Center is the only service in Japan openly arranging surrogate pregnancies, some gynecologists are believed to have performed egg transplants.
The Infertility Center pays surrogate mothers $10,000. The rest of the cost is mainly for the medical procedure, which must be done outside Japan.
No Japanese law prohibits surrogate motherhood, but ethical standards set by the Japan Society of Obstetrics and Gynecology say an egg removed for fertilization cannot be implanted in another woman. The society also limits in vitro, or "test tube," fertilization to married couples.
Toranoshin Ono, director of Ichikawa General Hospital, sees surrogate motherhood as shaking "the very foundation of our social order."
He believes the children would not fit neatly into the mandatory registries that provide basic information about every Japanese citizen, including identities of the mother and father.