EDITORIAL — Another cautionary tale

We thought Filipino women who are trafficked outside the Philippines are only made to labor in sweatshops, scam foreigners online, get overworked and underpaid as domestic helpers, or forced to engage in prostitution. But it seems that they are also being trafficked to become surrogates.

Just recently 20 Filipino women were rescued from a surrogacy operation in Cambodia. Thirteen of them are in various stages of pregnancy and have to stay there for the meantime while the rest are awaiting repatriation.

For those not familiar with surrogacy, it’s when a woman agrees to carry, bring to term, and then give birth to the child of another woman in exchange for payment. While surrogacy is legal in countries like the USA, the UK, Canada, Georgia, Greece, Mexico, Colombia, Argentina, Guatemala, Greece, and Australia, it is illegal in other countries.

In some ways surrogacy, especially if it is forced, is even worse than prostitution. While in prostitution women are forced into sex which can be over in a short time, in surrogacy they have to be a prisoner of something they may have had no choice in for nine months.

And the end of the nine months is also no guarantee that the suffering is over, as we all know about the bond formed between a mother and a child she carries in her womb, even if the child isn’t hers at all and is just “renting” the space inside her.

And if those running the surrogacy operation is an illegal group or, worse, a criminal syndicate, then there is also no guarantee that they will get paid fairly or even at all.

We aren’t sure if some or all of those 20 women were forced into surrogacy or if they willingly left the country to carry to term then give birth to children that will not be theirs, but either way this should serve as another cautionary tale for those who want to work abroad. They should always make sure to go through the proper channels and make sure they know what they are getting into.