Saudi Gazette report

 

DAMMAM — Private hospitals are carrying out pre-conception gender selection operations and reporting them as IV fertilization or artificial fertilization in response to a growing number of patients’ requests, Al-Hayat daily reported.



Pre-conception gender selection operations are prohibited by the Ministry of Health although there are no religious prohibitions.



Sheikh Khalid Abdulah Al-Muslih said in his study on such procedures that scholars are split on the issue.



There is no religious text forbidding gender selection before conception, said Sheikh Al-Muslih.



Eastern Province Health Affairs spokesman Khalid Al-Osaimi said such operations are forbidden and would never happen in public hospitals. Sociologists believed parents who want such operations are looking to have boys, especially if there are none in their families.



Sociologist Saleh Al-Nimer said pre-conception gender selection operations have led to decreased rates of divorce in the Kingdom’s patriarchal society.



Many wives fear their husbands will replace them if they do not conceive a boy, said Al-Nimer.



The Eastern Province’s supervisor of private hospitals’ fertility units Dr. Essam Al-Hameed said these operations are not carried out in public hospitals, only private ones.



Public hospitals only offer IV fertilization and infertility treatments, said Al-Hameed.



He said: “The Kingdom has witnessed an increase of 2 percent in pre-conception gender selection operations since last year.



“Last year, the rate of pre-conception gender selection operations was 4 percent and this year it reached 6 percent of all operations.



“They are prohibited by the ministry and private hospitals that offer this service are defying the ministry.”



Doctors reported the first occurrence of pre-conception gender selection operations was in 2006.



People were apprehensive about undergoing such procedures until an edict in 2008 was issued verifying that they were not against Islam.



The Eastern Province’s head of private hospitals’ fertility units Dr. Ibrahim Al-Sharnoubi said big hospitals in the Eastern Province carry out around seven pre-conception gender selection operations on a monthly basis.



Another doctor who wished to remain anonymous said pre-conception gender selection operations sometimes happen but are usually registered in the patient’s medical file as artificial fertilization as requested. This is viewed as part of patient-physician confidentiality, said the doctor.