This is horrible. These people (the Australians) are assholes. The child with Down's syndrome is *their* child, genetically, and they have abandoned it. They have abandoned their baby and in the process treated the surrogate mother with contempt.

Of course the choice to abort should rest with the surrogate mother as it is her body that has to go through the effort, pain, and risk of actually having the baby. If they wanted to reserve the right to ask for the fetus to be aborted, they should have taken steps to find a surrogate mother who would be willing to abort if they asked.

It sickens me that we live in a world where rich people can pay poor people to have babies for them, and then just walk away if they decide they don't want the baby after all because it has an illness and looking after it would cramp their luxurious lifestyle.

"but isn't bringing a child with known life-threatening disabilities into the world against the wishes of the parents also at least questionable?"

The disabilities are not more life-threatening than an abortion. She thought it would be murder; choosing not to murder somebody is not ethically questionable.

You could of course point out that, for somebody who disagrees with her ethical evaluation, that point might not be relevant. But I don't think there's a strong argument the other way. Hopefully nobody would argue that there's an ethical *duty* to abort somebody with Down's syndrome. And as for "against the wishes of the parents" -- they pretty much gave up plenary authority on the issue when they used her womb.

Just on the narrow legal point, a child born overseas to an Australian citizen does not acquire automatic Australian citizenship; it has to be applied for. This applies to all children born overseas not just children born to surrogate mothers. If the Australians haven't applied for the male twin to be an Australian Citizen, then he isn't one. Not sure who else, if anyone, can apply to have the child's citizenship altered.

@ semck: "they pretty much gave up plenary authority on the issue when they used her womb."

Absolutely. Well put.

>If they wanted to reserve the right to ask for the fetus to be aborted, they should have
>taken steps to find a surrogate mother who would be willing to abort if they asked.
Agreed.

>If the Australians haven't applied for the male twin to be an Australian Citizen, then he isn't one.
Hmm didn't realize that

Could a surrogate mother choose to abort if the parents didn't want to, or is it a one-way street?

Trying to tip-toe around the question of whether first trimester abortion is murder and whether the ethics should revolve around preserving human life or reducing suffering etc (noting that this is a case of both Down's syndrome and a serious heart condition), which I don't have strong views on myself, and consider the unique case, but this is probably inevitably going to be dragged back into it.

The real problem stems from the fact that this dispute involves two parties who had different expectations and beliefs, so when everything didn't go as planned, naturally, both parties felt like they didn't have control of the situation. A better contract could have solved this, so both know exactly what is expected of them and what their obligations are.

I don't really see what's so tragic about it.

"Could a surrogate mother choose to abort if the parents didn't want to, or is it a one-way street?"

Now THAT is an interesting and complicated question!

I guess for me, fundamentally, the answer is still yes. Forcing a woman to bring a child to term... well, we all know the argument and like kestas says there is no reason to go there. That doesn't mean she shouldn't be liable for breaching her contract, of course.

There are lots of issues here that are ripe for discussion. Parental rights of surrogate parents, legal and contractual issues, citizenship, abortion, and to top it off, its an international incident involving rich parents and a poor surrogate. You can even bring up genetic modification and "designer babies" to a certain degree.

YJ is absolutely right that this could have been solved with a better contract. Not knowing the details of the arrangement, though, makes judgment difficult.

"they pretty much gave up plenary authority on the issue when they used her womb."

Another excellent point for discussion. Does parental authority outweigh the right of a woman to decide what to do with her own body? Is the surrogate mother a mere container or do her human rights get brought into the equation?

The surrogate mother made the call on this, would she have still got paid had she delivered no baby ..... her reason for being a surrogate is financial I guess, it was a business deal, the parents picked the wrong surrogate mother because they had not looked into all of the potential problems that could occur.
In light of some of the things happening at this moment in other parts of the globe this seems like a small issue but on-going I am sure this kind of issue will occur more and more as we start to genetically engineer babies.
Currently this may seem unacceptable to many but given the choice would you not like to determine certain things about your child like its sex ... there will be people queueing up for their frankenstein babies.
The Australian may have made really bad parents of the down syndrome child, it sounds like they may have a better life where they are than with the Aussies, I hope so.

These are indeed weighty questions.

I'm generally against rich assholes and eugenics, but I actually anything that should be truly thought of as extra wrong. I agree that the woman shouldn't have been forced to have an abortion, but I think by refusing to have an abortion the woman accepted the baby as her responsibility. Likewise, if a guy gets a woman pregnant, I think that if he makes it clear that he wants an abortion, his responsibilities to said child should be waived/lessened if she decides to keep the abby.

Well, on Socrates' first point I agree. By agreeing to be a surrogate mother, this woman has essentially leased her womb to this other couple for 9 months. Therefore, if the parents say "please abort this child" and she doesn't, it isn't illogical to say that said child will then become the surrogate mother's responsibility.

Goldfinger, I think the lease analogy is a very good one up to a point, but leasing an apartment doesn't get you total control, especially over life-or-death issues, and much less someone's womb.

I don't think goldfinger or i think that they get total control over the womb. they have no right to force the abortion. but if they want the surrogate to have an abortion, and the surrogate refuses, then the surrogate takes responsibility of the child.

In a modern world no child should be born with down's syndrome if it's caught early in the pregnancy. It's a strain on parents, medical organizations, and schools, and it's unlikely any person with Downs will be a fully functional, productive member of society.

The surrogate parents wanted the child aborted. Since they are the parents, the decision is theirs, and if the surrogate mother refuses, that's on her. I don't have any issue with what they did, other than perhaps they could have brought the baby back to Australia and put it up for adoption (I don't know if Aus has any laws regarding Downs children being unable to be placed for adoption or anything).

"if a guy gets a woman pregnant, I think that if he makes it clear that he wants an abortion, his responsibilities to said child should be waived/lessened if she decides to keep the baby."
I heartily disconcur. He IS the father, and the child IS his responsibility. He took that responsibility (even if inadvertently) as soon as his semen went into her body, and no amount of wishing can relieve him of it -- legally, ethically, morally -- particularly if the mother wishes to own up to her responsibility and keep the child. If he does shirk his responsibility, then he's abandoning the child and should be treated as such.

As for the anonymous (for now) Australians, I'm not going to get into the legal side of it too deeply. I'm not exactly well-versed in Thai family law -- other than that, according to the NZ Herald, the whole arrangement violated that law, since surrogacy is only legal if 1) there is no money and 2) the surrogate is related to the parents. On an ethical level, I think the child is the Australians' responsibility. If they wanted to make sure they could abort the child if things went wrong , then they shouldn't have used a surrogate. Their right to determine the course of the pregnancy -- other than to insist on receiving back the babies they temporarily gave up once the due date arrived -- should have been restricted. Ordering the woman to follow a particular diet would, I think, have been beyond the scope of their rights just as much as ordering her to abort the child. Her refusal to follow either of these orders, or any others that would affect her person, would not relieve the parents of their responsibility to take the child and deal with him themselves once he was born. They shirked their responsibility, abandoned the child, and should be treated as such.

Wait a second... I thought it was a common thing for people to dictate the diets of the surrogate

Outside smoker: so you think it's fair that the woman can get an abortion without agreement from the guy, but the guy can't rid himself of the burden of childhood (not by forcing an abortion, of course)? I think in practise it would be complicated, but in theory not so troubling.

As for the Australians, what if they couldn't have a kid but by using a surrogate (i'm not familiar with what a surrogate was used in this case but it's irrelevant to my personal view)? Then do they have no right to choose an abortion? I won't repeat what I said before but they do have a right to request an abortion, and to give up responsibility to the child. Oh, and you know parents don't always have the right to insist on receiving the baby back from surrogates.

Often parents dictate a lot of things to surrogates to help with the growth of the foetus, diet being an obvious one.

@Soc Dis, I think that in the end it's the woman's final say, as she's the one who actually has to carry the child and give birth, but the man should definitely get a say as well. Any real solution has to come on a case by case basis, but I think that, in general, say "I want you to get an abortion and won't help you if you don't" is the same as saying "I won't help support or care for our child" and be treated accordingly.

I agree, the 'abortion' should in the end be her decision, but if you think the man deserves a say, then in theory, what would you have? practical legislation would be much more complicated, but in an ideal society?

Just with regards to the points made by Kestas and YJ about a the need for a better contract and that the woman should be liable for breach if she didn't abort. On this occassion a 'better' contract wouldn't have helped. Abortion in Thailand is illegal (apart from some cases which aren't relevant here). The court can not therefore enforce a contract that requires one party to act illegally.

Intending parents are not recognized as legal parents in Thailand or Australia, so the baby is by law, the surrogate parent's. If she didn't want the burden, then don't have the baby. Neither side deserves any sympathy here.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-04-13/thai-surrogacy-concerns/4624388

Also, Australian laws are weird. It seems that commercial surrogacy is illegal for half of Australia and legal for the other half.