The global landscape of cross-border reproductive care:... : Current Opinion in Obstetrics and Gynecology (original) (raw)

FERTILITY: Edited by Aydin Arici

twenty key findings for the new millennium

aDepartment of Anthropology and MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies

bYale Fertility Center and Reproductive Endocrinology, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA

Correspondence to Marcia C. Inhorn, PhD, MPH, William K. Lanman, Jr. Professor, Department of Anthropology, Yale University, 10 Sachem Street, P.O. Box 208277, New Haven, CT 06520-8277, USA. Tel: +1 203 432 4510; e-mail: [email protected]

Abstract

Purpose of review

Cross-border reproductive care (CBRC), also known as procreative tourism, fertility tourism, or reproductive tourism, is an increasing global phenomenon. This article reviews the expanding scholarly literature on CBRC, with 2010–2011 representing watershed years for CBRC scholarship and activism.

Recent findings

Terminological debates, missing data, and lack of international monitoring plague the study of CBRC. Nonetheless, it is widely acknowledged that CBRC is a growing industry, with new global hubs, new intermediaries, new media, and new spaces of interaction. Religious bans and legal restrictions have created a patchwork of ‘restrictive’ and ‘permissive’ countries, with law evasion being a primary driver of CBRC. Yet, patient motivations for CBRC are diverse and patients’ levels of satisfaction with CBRC and its outcomes are generally high. Thus, scholarly concern with CBRC as law evasion must be tempered with qualitative studies of positive patient experiences.

Summary

CBRC can be considered a form of ‘global gynecology’ in which reproductive medicine, tourism, and commerce are converging in the second decade of the new millennium.