1/23/2015
BEIJING – China has launched a campaign to stop the shipment of blood samples to Hong Kong by pregnant women who wish to know the sex of their baby, a practice forbidden in mainland China, as part of efforts to put an end to selective abortions, a newspaper reported Thursday.
According to the South China Morning Post, 14 government agencies, including the Ministry of Public Security and National Health and Family Planning Commission, are involved in this campaign.
A circular sent on Wednesday instructed the relevant authorities to censor online advertising for these services, as well as related searches on the internet.
Likewise, hospitals and clinics have received orders to increase supervision on the collection of blood from pregnant women for possible DNA testing, while border posts between mainland China and Hong Kong will also have to increase controls in this regard.
In addition, “informants” who report these practices will be rewarded by the government, the newspaper reported.
Except for medical reasons, it is forbidden to perform sex determination tests in China due to the proliferation of selective abortions of female babies, which is partly a consequence of the one-child policy implemented in the early 1970s.
However, there are many illegal clinics in the country that perform ultrasounds to determine the gender of the baby, although in the past years it has become very popular to send blood samples mostly to Hong Kong for DNA analysis.
The campaign to prevent these practices comes after China decided to relax the one-child policy last year and would permit those couples to have two children, provided either parent is an only child.
Previously, it was mandatory for both partners to be a single child.
Easing of the measure is mainly due to the rapid aging of the population and labor shortages, factors that have slowed down economic growth.
Although a million couples requested permission for a second child in China in 2014, it is a figure lower than expected, so the authorities have initiated measures to encourage potential parents in a country with the largest disparity in the world between the births of boys and girls.
Last year, for every 118 boys born there were 100 girls.
For $644, a Chinese woman can send her blood sample to Hong Kong through the border city of Shenzhen and receive the results the next day with a 99 percent reliability.
source
BEIJING – China has launched a campaign to stop the shipment of blood samples to Hong Kong by pregnant women who wish to know the sex of their baby, a practice forbidden in mainland China, as part of efforts to put an end to selective abortions, a newspaper reported Thursday.
According to the South China Morning Post, 14 government agencies, including the Ministry of Public Security and National Health and Family Planning Commission, are involved in this campaign.
A circular sent on Wednesday instructed the relevant authorities to censor online advertising for these services, as well as related searches on the internet.
Likewise, hospitals and clinics have received orders to increase supervision on the collection of blood from pregnant women for possible DNA testing, while border posts between mainland China and Hong Kong will also have to increase controls in this regard.
In addition, “informants” who report these practices will be rewarded by the government, the newspaper reported.
Except for medical reasons, it is forbidden to perform sex determination tests in China due to the proliferation of selective abortions of female babies, which is partly a consequence of the one-child policy implemented in the early 1970s.
However, there are many illegal clinics in the country that perform ultrasounds to determine the gender of the baby, although in the past years it has become very popular to send blood samples mostly to Hong Kong for DNA analysis.
The campaign to prevent these practices comes after China decided to relax the one-child policy last year and would permit those couples to have two children, provided either parent is an only child.
Previously, it was mandatory for both partners to be a single child.
Easing of the measure is mainly due to the rapid aging of the population and labor shortages, factors that have slowed down economic growth.
Although a million couples requested permission for a second child in China in 2014, it is a figure lower than expected, so the authorities have initiated measures to encourage potential parents in a country with the largest disparity in the world between the births of boys and girls.
Last year, for every 118 boys born there were 100 girls.
For $644, a Chinese woman can send her blood sample to Hong Kong through the border city of Shenzhen and receive the results the next day with a 99 percent reliability.
source
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