Baby By Stealth: Reproduction law forcing ‘dangerous alternatives’ - National Post 3/12/10

(My note: I'm not sure what is being advocated for in this article. Are they suggesting that repro-tech in Canada should be as unregulated as it is in the United States for fear of "underground/blackmarket" baby making (regulating repro-tech does not raise the same concerns as back alley wire hanger abortions). I can't believe the fear of a few desperate individuals (no one has an absolute right to a child under any circumstances) justifies a wild west unregulated repro-industry approach. I'm not in agreement on this one.)

**UPDATE: There was an EXCELLENT rebuttal to this article written by Dr. Juliet Guichon, Senior Associate in the Office of Medical Bioethics and a faculty member of the Department of Community Health Sciences in the University of Calgary Faculty of Medicine, here:
http://ucalgarymedicine.wordpress.com/2010/03/23/baby-by-stealth-only-co...)

http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=2677573

Baby By Stealth: Reproduction law forcing ‘dangerous alternatives’
Kathryn Blaze Carlson, National Post
Published: Friday, March 12, 2010

"At the same time as reproductive technologies stretch the notion of the family beyond the nuclear, and just as Canada bends to accommodate that evolution, a prevailing piece of federal legislation is being accused of inadvertently forcing a slew of prospective parents underground.

At the root of this underworld, some argue, is the 2004 Assisted Human Reproduction Act -- the Canadian government's most comprehensive attempt to regulate reproductive technologies. Some onlookers fear that the legislation has created a secretive black market, where couples seek sperm and egg donors on Craigslist or in university libraries.

Where those couples quietly compensate donors for their gametes, despite the legislation that criminalizes doing so. Where lesbian couples lie to doctors about their sexual orientation to avoid paying to quarantine a friend's sperm for six months. And where doctors and counsellors sometimes adopt the credo of "Don't ask, Don't tell."

The act -- which is a result of the Royal Commission on New Reproductive Technologies in 1993 -- has triggered condemnation from the right and left, and was the focal point of an International Women's Day conference in Toronto last week. There, at the Law Society of Upper Canada, panellists argued that some of the legislation does more to imperil and confuse prospective parents and their offspring than it does to protect them.

The act's aftermath has some significant real-world, legal implications, said lawyer Kelly Jordan, who specializes in family law and assisted reproductive technologies at Toronto firm Jordan Battista.

"Right now, we don't have any guidance about the rights of donors, carriers and surrogates, and there has been virtually no case law in Canada to deal with those questions," Ms. Jordan said.

"For example, if an egg donor in Ontario dies without a will, do her genetic children inherit her estate? Can a sperm donor be ordered to pay child support? Those are some of the questions that have yet to be answered."

Ms. Jordan said there is also the lingering issue of jurisdiction: The act is federal, but health falls under provincial purview. In 2008, the Quebec Court of Appeal ruled that large parts of the legislation, including those related to regulating the treatment of infertility, fall under provincial jurisdiction and are therefore unconstitutional. The case made it to the Supreme Court in April 2009 but, nearly a year later, the court has yet to release a decision.

Looking back, Canada has a history of amending its laws to accommodate the evolution of what constitutes a family, and citizens have long fought for the right to create a family no matter their sexual orientation, race, religion, ability or class.

For some, the right to family has gone too far, sacrificing the sanctity of family in the unfounded quest for equity. For others, the concept of the "family" is still too constrained -- they would argue there should not have been an uproar, for example, over the pregnant transgendered man who appeared on Oprah in 2008."

Read more: http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=2677573