CGS-authored
In the United States and a few other prosperous, technologically advanced countries, methods of sex selection that are less intrusive or more reliable than older practices are now coming into use. Unlike prenatal testing, these procedures are applied either before an embryo is implanted in a woman's body, or before an egg is fertilized. They do not require aborting a fetus of the "wrong" sex.
These pre-pregnancy sex selection methods are being rapidly commercialized - not, as before, with medical claims, but as a means of satisfying parental desires. For the assisted reproduction industry, social sex selection may be a business path toward a vastly expanded market. People who have no infertility or medical problems, but who can afford expensive out-of-pocket procedures, are an enticing new target.
For the first time, some fertility clinics are openly advertising sex selection for social reasons. Several times each month, for example, the New York Times' Sunday Styles section carries an ad from the Virginia-based Genetics & IVF (in-vitro fertilization) Institute, touting its patented sperm-sorting method. Alongside a smiling baby, its boldface headline...