According to the Minister of Health, Zurab Azarashvili, in vitro fertilization and surrogacy will be allowed only for Georgian citizens from January 1, 2024.
As the Minister explained at the briefing held after the end of the Government session, the legislative initiative on the mentioned issue will be submitted to the Parliament this week.
According to the Minister, only Georgian citizens will be able to have a child through in vitro fertilization and surrogacy, and it will be prohibited for citizens of foreign countries.
"If it is possible for this to be one of the opportunities for the reproduction of Georgian citizens in the demographic direction, we leave both in vitro fertilization and surrogacy opportunities only for Georgian citizens. The bill will be sent to the Parliament this week. We think that it will be approved in the fall and will come into force on January 1, 2024, after which this problem will be solved once and for all," Azarashvili said.
The Minister also spoke about the reasons why the government decided to ban surrogacy and in vitro fertilization for foreign citizens.
"It is associated with various unethical and very bad practices, because this direction was not regulated. It posed many different dangers, the same could be the case with child trafficking, I don't want to speak in the form of an assertion. Also, as you know, there is a huge challenge with organ trafficking.
Since the issue was unregulated, we could not track where these children were going. It doesn't matter if the {parents} could be same-sex, there would be different problems with trafficking and child trafficking. Therefore, it was left to the citizens of Georgia," Azarashvili said.
As the Minister said, according to the legislative changes, advertisements related to in vitro fertilization and surrogacy will be prohibited in Georgia.
In addition, Azarashvili states that the "principle of altruism" will be regulated by law.
"An important and fundamental thing regulated by this law is the principle of altruism. A citizen of Georgia, who wants to be a donor or surrogate, should act based on the principle of selflessness and only receive compensation that may be related to inconvenience related to this process, or medical examinations, or expenses related to childbirth," said the minister.
