Wednesday, July 3, 2013

Why is the Indian government creating obstacles for IVF tourism?


While patients from all over the world continue to visit India for IVF treatment, especially surrogacy, the Indian government has unfortunately made it difficult for Indian clinics to deliver IVF services. It is even worse because the ICMR has refused to authorize embryo importation into the country using the excuse that the government is yet to authorize the right IVF clinics to import embryos. This is despite the fact that embryo importation is a good foreign exchange earner.

Moreover, several months down the line, ICMR is yet to respond to concerns from the IVF sector stakeholders and the inspection and registration of IVF clinics is yet to begin. In the meantime though, several patients who had hoped to get babies through surrogacy in India have seen their dreams squashed and have opted for Shipping frozen embryos  to more liberalized countries such as Thailand.

Therefore, while it is true that the Indian medical sector is among the very best in the world and continues to offer medical services at a fraction of the cost of hospitals in the West, bureaucratic government procedures could see a decline in Indian IVF tourism as well as loss in foreign exchange.

While it is important for the government to regulate the health sector, it is disheartening for the same government to put procedures that only hurt the thousands of patients waiting anxiously to have their children and shower them with love.

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