A new at-home test that claims to give prospective parents an early clue in determining the sex of a fetus is raising concerns in New Zealand that its debut there will increase the number of abortions.
The test-makers claim a 90 percent accuracy rate after 10 weeks (though that hasn't been independently verified), which doesn't approach the much greater accuracy of an ultrasound, typically done by a doctor at 18 weeks. The test, made by IntelliGender, is already available in the United States and has not yet been the subject of much controversy here, as the company has not claimed that it's meant to compete with or be used as a medical technology, like the ultrasound.
Still, some in New Zealand are worried that the tests could be viewed as such and used for sex selection. Via LiveScience, Dr. Ted Weaver of the The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists is quoted saying, "The concern we would have is that people would then terminate pregnancies on the grounds of sex selection."
In China, according to a study released in April by the British Medical Journal, men under 20 now outnumber women under 20 by more than 32 million, a number researchers attribute largely to sex-selective abortions and the government's one-child policy. That demographic imbalance has been raising red flags as people struggle to work out what family structures are going to look like.
Attempts at sex selection shouldn't be blamed on technology, though, and they certainly shouldn't be blamed on women's access to it. In China, some officials have tried to make a dent in the problem of sex imbalance by banning physicians from revealing the sex of the fetus to parents during the ultrasound. Not surprisingly, this hasn't been a success, as underground testing is widely available, not to mention the difficulty in enforcing a ban on what a physician is able to say.
A sex imbalance in a population, though, is not the result of knowing the sex of a fetus. It's the result of refusing to acknowledge the equal worth of a son and a daughter. Trying to limit women's knowledge of what is happening with their pregnancies is not a solution -- it is an extension of the problem.
So what is the solution? It may already be at hand in the expressed preferences of women. Though men still greatly outnumber women in China, the number of births in 2005 (the latest year data was available) was closer to an equal ratio than in years past. And the British Medical Journal also reports an upswing in Chinese cities (where over half of the population lives) of women reporting no preference for either a boy or girl. |