To think if you pay for a surrogate baby that you decide you don't want you should pay for the op he needs.

[sashh]

An Australian couple have paid a Thai woman to be a surrogate, she had twins but one has Down Syndrome so they left him behind and took his sister home.

He has a hole in the heart (news reporting that it is in addition to DS, actually it is more likely part of the DS) and his mum can't afford his op.

Surely the least you can do is pay for his bloomin' op?

Obviously there should have been an agreement with who pays for what under what circumstances but in reality is a poor person in a developing country going to think about that?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-28617912

www.abc.net.au/news/2014-08-01/mother-of-thai-baby-abandoned-by-surrogate-parents-struggles-to/5642478

The couple are in the paper today saying they didn't know anything about there being a twin.

Don't know how that squares with the fact they supposedly paid more once they knew it was twins...?

Mmm unless they genuinely though he'd been aborted..? Though I thought they'd paid extra according to another report, for a second baby.

Well if they didn't know then they'll be on the next plane to Thailand surely.....?
We'll see.

It's been 6 months, they shouldn't take him now even if they wanted to

Plinth I agree that after 6 months the surrogate is the only mum he knows and is his legal guardian too but if, for argument sake, I discovered I had a child I didn't know about in another country, I'd be compelled to at least go see them and sort out their care arrangements. But if the world was watching I'd probably go to ground.

Other possibility with all this is that the surrogate has realised that people in the west would think it's awful for the twin to be left there and us now seen an easyvopportunity to make money by suing them.

Personally I would never trust the version if the newspaper. Facts will always have been put in such a way to create reaction. And it did. With all the problems coming with it.

And I can't see the issue with the twin going to live with his intended parents. After all the situation wouldn't be different than he was adopted. The woman caring for him carries him but isn't his mum so for me it would be more like he would finally go back to his family after being separated at birth, what ever the reason.
I don't think you can forget the very strong blood/genetic links with the 'intended parents'.

Don't know how that squares with the fact they supposedly paid more once they knew it was twins...?

Maybe they didn't! We have heard ONE version of this so far. We have NO idea that what we have been told is true!

For all we know it could be a huge lie about the twin being part of the surrogacy, and the woman is trying to get money from someone because she didn't see what she was 'owed'

Cynical, I know...but then again, most of these replies are cynical against the 'intended parents'

Everyone seems to have swallowed the only version we are being told as complete fact.

OneDreamOnly the one thing for sure is that not everyone is telling a consistent story for whatever reason. It's a hugely emotive story and at least people who contribute to this fund are helping to ensure this little boy has the medical care he needs. What a messy, complicated situation though.

I don't get why this is easier than adoption from another county? How is there not the same amount of red tape? You are still trying to bring home a child from another country than has been born to another woman who is giving it to you. How is doing that easier?

Ans also bear in mind that the surrogate wasn't paid the full amount she was owed, so perhaps there was NO additional payment for the 2nd child & the agency told her there was, playing her & the parents at totally different games, as they didn't want to lose money, either by a] losing the surrogate or 2] losing the parents money

It's a hugely emotive story and at least people who contribute to this fund are helping to ensure this little boy has the medical care he needs.

Will he? Because (being cynical) the mother has said she went into surrogacy to pay debts. It doesn't take a big leap to think that because she didn't see what she was expecting from the arrangement, so she concocted a story about this couple abandoning their child's twin to extort money out of people.

I am not saying that is what happened, but people don't seem to to be seeing the other side of it.

Personally I don't trust the agency. This kind of surrogacy is not actually legal in Thailand. I expect they are dodgy to start with.

And can you imagine if this is true. Finding out that you left behind your own child, regardless of whether or not they have Downs. Frankly the only reason why I'd not be on the first plane to Thailand is that I'd have fallen to pieces.

I wouldn't want to rip him away from his surrogate mother but I wouldn't be able to leave him either once I knew.

Differentnameforthis I am really hoping the intended parents genuinely didn't know about him and it's all been down to the agency and communication issues. That's what I'd rather believe any day.I'm hoping they will confirm that. I don't wasn't to see them as villains I'd rather they were unassuming and unaware. That might be the case or it might not. But the fact is they know now and that does change things surely?

Oh different name that's being cynical against the surrogate now. When did she become the villain?

I am naturally cynical. In the article linked by differentnameforthis above there was a quote from the surrogate:

"“I’m going to save the money for him,” Ms Pattaramon said.

“Actually, I just want the baby to have a house. It doesn’t have to be big. I only want him to live in a good house and be comfortable.”"

Not that she wants his medical issues to be dealt with, or that she wants him supported in whatever way he needs, or that she wants to be able to look after him but still have educational needs provided for her other kids (which I understood was why she underwent the surrogacy in the first place). No, the thing she wants for her son is a house.

In the same article the Australian parents had been found, admitted that they had a daughter born to a surrogate in Thailand and claim to know nothing about any sibling.

I cannot believe the story about the father coming to the hospital and ignoring the boy if he knew the boy was the twin. That scenario seems more believable to me if indeed he did not know that the boy was a twin, because why would he be interested in some other, as far as he knows random, baby in the same hospital? IMO, the story about the father ignoring the boy in the hospital actually lends support to the idea that the Australian parents knew nothing about him.

I can't help but feel that the couple in Australia are perhaps unfairly being treated as villains here, and as someone pointed out above, they can't win now. If they didn't know about the boy before, what are they to do? If they bring him back to Australia they have "snatched him from the only family he's ever known", but if they leave him where he is they have "separated him from his twin and abandoned him because he has DS". If I were them I would be in hiding too.

In the same article the surrogate is quoted as saying she was not mad at the couple and never hated them. If she is indeed thinking of suing now, then I would say that someone has been egging her on and filling her head with ideas. Not saying that she wouldn't have a case against them, in fact, I don't know enough about either the law or the specific facts in this case to decide either way, but it is an about-face for her to go from not being angry to suing, makes me wonder who's been talking to her.

It won't be the first time that papers will have twisted information or not done their home work.
It's not the first time that people will try and use the media to get what they want. Either with the surrogate using the media to get money or the intended parents trying to wriggle their way out of it.

The reality is that we don't know. And that the last thing to do is to send money 'to help the poor child' when we have so lite idea if what is really going there.

Momnipotent if there's a question about his parentage that would be fairly straightforward to check surely with a DNA test.

Just because she wants a house for him doesn't necessarily mean she doesn't love him though, it does make it sound like her motives are less pure but she could have plans for his welfare we don't know about. His most pressing needs, apart from love and care, are medical. Presumably a roof over his head is OK too, perhaps her current house is unsuitable for such an ill child? I don't know the answer I'm just saying poor housing and illness are a bad start to life for anyone.

I know microcosmia. I am trying not to judge anyone in this situation.

Overwhelmingly, the reports I have seen have all been focused on these awful Australian parents that have abandoned this adorable baby with medical needs in a foreign country with substandard health care after illegally hiring a poor woman to be surrogate. The majority of the responses on this thread have been in a similar vein.

I am just trying to point out that it may not be as cut and dried as that, the Australian parents may not be as villainous as they have been painted and similarly the surrogate may not be as altruistic as she has been painted.

Indeed momnipitent they do say there's three sides to every story, one side, the other side and the the truth.

anyone who is prepared to pay money for someone in a third world country to give them a baby already has dubious morals. Just because someone is desperate for a baby does not give them the right to exploit whoever they need to in order to make that happen even if the person they are exploiting lives in poverty in a country where that amount of money is life-changing, and where someone might have the choice between being a surrogate or a prostitute.
The instant that couple entered into an agreement with a woman in Thailand they were in the wrong. Just because something can be done, doesn't mean that it should.

The woman in Thailand couldn't possibly have known that she could exploit this couple or the Australian public into giving her money by withholding one of the twins. And let's not forget that this twin is now six months old, if she wanted to do that why didn't she go to the press when it was a newborn and the parents were in the hospital?

And I don't agree that the best thing now is to leave this baby with her if the parents really had no idea. He is only six months old, he will quickly adjust to being with different parents, children have to do it all the time if parents are absent because of illness/ifchildren go into foster care/are adopted etc. If they are genuinely innocent they should be on the first plane to Australia to collect their son to bring him back to Australia for the medical treatment he needs. Somehow I don't think that will happen though eh.

"
similarly the surrogate may not be as altruistic as she has been painted." personally I think that if some of these surrogates exploit these couples to the tune of more money (I'm not talking about withholding a baby here but about demanding more money) then it's no more than they deserve for trying to exploit women in foreign countries in the first place.

Surrogacy is a whole industry in some countries e.g. india, where there are homes for surrogates to live out their pregnancies until the rich parents show up to collect the babies from the women they've never so much as laid eyes on. Despicable practice which has turned babies into commodities who can be bought for the highest price.

OK there's another twist or two since. See www.news.com/au

Apparently the couple are denying being the parents.

Another report too on Channel Nine........worrying