Choose Your Baby's Gender With A $1,000 Sperm Sorting Technique

By: marvin Posted: September 4, 2007

When polled, over 20% of British people would pay over the equivalent of $1,000 US dollars to choose their baby's sex.

Sorting Technique

Currently, though not fully approved for use, techniques exist which can sort the male sperm from the female sperm. This would effectively increase the potential parents chances of producing a baby of the desired sex.

The study was conducted by German researchers who also found that over 20% of people would be willing to pay for being able to select their child's gender.

Currently, there are some types of "sperm-sorting" techniques on the market that are legal. These techniques involve the use of fresh sperm and use insemination as opposed to the creation of an embryo outside of the body.

Opponents argue that being able to choose a child's sex, could become very popular and end up changing the natural balance between male and female births throughout the world.

Favoritism

Researchers at the University of Geissen performed the survey and the results were published in the journal Human Reproduction. The results suggest that there is no risk of the skew in genders taking place even if many couples choose to use the sorting techniques.

The results in the United Kingdom also indicated that the vast majority, over 68% preferred an equal number of boys and girls in their family. Whereas only 3% preferred only boys and 2% only girls.

A total of 6% of people indicated that they would like more boys than girls, whereas 16% prefer their first born to be a girl.

Only slightly few respondents said that they wanted more girls than boys and that their first born was to be a boy. Therefore researchers have concluded that the effect on future boy / girl ratios would be insignificant.

Dr Edgar Dahl, a key researcher behind the study, said: "Much of the opposition to social 'sex' selection is based on the assumed danger of a sex ratio distortion due to a common preference for boys over girls."

"According to our surveys, this assumption seems to be unfounded."

Expensive choice

21% of Britain people, stated that they would pay over the equivalent of $1,000 US Dollars per attempt for up to five insemination attempts utilizing sorted sperm. 71% said that they would never choose their baby's sex and 7% were undecided.

In Germany a similar study was performed and only 6% said they would try the procedure. The German study proposed a hypothetical that asked whether if they took a blue pill for a boy and a pink pill for a girl, they would try it. 90% of respondents rejected the idea.

Researchers believe that the overall preference is for a balanced family and many believe that balance will ensue naturally.

"Sex selection is not legal in the UK at present if it involves using sorted sperm in IV techniques to create an embryo - but not if it involves insemination with fresh sperm."