The arrest of Navaporn Phakiatsakul -- a Chinese woman of Thai nationality -- has put the spotlight on the issue of illegal surrogacy.
Ms Navaporn, 53, was arrested early this month and is accused of being involved in the kidnapping of Chinese nationals in Chon Buri province. She has also been accused of being the leader of a criminal syndicate involving financial fraud and human trafficking.
At her office building on Silom Road in Bangkok's Bang Rak district, police also found rooms and equipment arranged for Thai women who were surrogate mothers for Chinese people.
Apart from selling babies to infertile Chinese couples, she also helps the couples gain Thai citizenship through their Thai-born children.
Her case is a reminder that illicit surrogacy still thrives despite efforts by the government to clamp down on it after a notorious case last year saw 22 Thai and Chinese nationals arrested -- four of them state doctors -- for involvement in an international surrogacy syndicate.
Led by a Chinese broker named Zhao Ran, who is still at large, the gang began operating in 2012, and at least 100 surrogate mothers were recruited and paid 450,000 baht for each pregnancy. In the case of Ms Navaporn, police suspected she might have run an illicit surrogacy service since 2019.
But these arrests cannot end what is a lucrative business. According to the Department of Health Service Support (DHSS), while there are about 20,000 patients who have sought in-vitro fertilisation (IVF), only 584 resorted to legal surrogacy last year.
Last May, the DHSS and the Department of Special Investigation (DSI) started working together to suppress illegal surrogacy. Yet, the mission rarely bears any fruit.
Unlike most other criminal violations, all those involved in illegal surrogacy -- medical doctors, agents, couples and surrogate mothers -- mutually consent to what they are doing and choose to be secretive.
Given how the police have struggled in dealing with illegal surrogacy, the government should focus on changing fundamental laws governing surrogacy.
Under the current law, only a relative of an infertile couple is permitted to be a surrogate mother. But there is the exception for non-relative surrogate mothers if infertile couples do not have a blood relative capable of doing so.
Meanwhile, the DHSS has prepared an amendment to the Protection of Children Born from Assisted Reproductive Technologies Act 2015 -- the ART Act for over two years.
Under the draft amendment, women can be hired legally as surrogates. The amendment would also enable foreigners to obtain legal surrogacy services in Thailand.
While surrogacy is and always will be a moral issue, this new law would allow the government to regulate, keep track and inspect what would become a commercial surrogacy industry.
A legalised commercial surrogacy industry would lead to the protection of a surrogate mother's rights and health and offer equitable benefit sharing. Above all, it would stamp out the underground market, which is often handled by dangerous syndicates also involved in human trafficking.
It is hoped the new government will pick this law up for debate and promulgate it. Every minute, day and month wasted results in criminal syndicates and their underground markets continuing to thrive.
