At the Edge of the Margins: New York legalizes commercial surrogacy — now what?

In the late hours of April 2, 2020, at the height of the COVID-19 crisis in New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo approved a direly needed state budget. Buried in that nearly 400-page document was a provision to legalize reproductive commercial surrogacy. Passed without the opportunity for legislative hearings or public debates, the law came into effect on February 15, 2021. Countries worldwide have banned reproductive surrogacy recognizing it as a practice engendering state-sanctioned human rights violations and maternal deaths. And yet, at a time of grave crises, New York is unleashing an exploitative multi-billion-dollar industry that preys on the socio-cultural and economic vulnerabilities of women.

The next virtual round table in CATW’s At the Edge of the Margins series will convene surrogacy survivors and medical experts to discuss the harms of commercial surrogacy and how the law will impact New York’s most marginalized women. With no state registry mandated in the law, how will New York gauge the inevitable risks to women's health, reproductive exploitation and maternal mortality in the state?