"’Homemade Zygotes — Just Like Mom’s!’" You may not be that far off!"
So writes investigator Ron Josephson. The phrase is familiar to regular readers of AIR’s Unclassified Ads section, in which an ad saying exactly that has been appearing relentlessly for years now. See for example, the Unclassified Ads section in the magazine’s Jan//Feb 2003 issue, which is here.
Investigator Josephson was intrigued at seeing the concept come to, er, life, in the February 23, 2004 edition of the Evening Standard. The articles begins:
Human eggs for sale on the net
By Isabel Oakeshott, Evening Standard, Health Correspondent
Human eggs are being put up for sale over the internet for the first time today.
Entrepreneurs are cashing in on the shortage of donor eggs by launching an international brokering service.
Women needing eggs for IVF treatment can now use a website offering a bank of potential donors from around the world.
The eggs will sell for thousands of pounds, with huge payments for donors and middlemen collecting hefty "introductory" fees.
Read the whole article here.