Posted on 11/02/2006 6:39:23 AM PST by NYer
A young woman has put her eggs for sale on the internet to pay off £15,000 of credit card debts.
Alexandra Saunders posted her details on an American website after reading about the huge amount that can be made in a woman's magazine.
The 26-year-old, who already has three jobs to try and pay off her debts, thought it would be an easy way to make money.
It is illegal for a woman to sell her eggs within the UK but egg donation is big business in the US where childless couples pay up to £20,000 in exchange the eggs of a young healthy woman.
Critics warned that many young women were unaware of the potential serious health risks of donating eggs.
They say that many donors are single, childless women in their 20s who are in debt and only interested in financial reward.
Miss Saunders, of High Wycombe, Bucks, admitted that she was lured by the prospect of money.
She said: 'I was sat in a doctor's waiting room and I read about it in a magazine.
'It just said, 'Sell your eggs for thirty grand' or something like that. There was the name of a website at the end of the piece which I can't remember the name of and I just put my name down.
'There was a long list of women who had also put their names down.
'You put down a few details about yourself such as whether you're healthy or smoke and that's it. I haven't heard anything yet but couples can get in touch with me directly.'
Miss Saunders works as a software co-ordinator during the day and works five nights a week in two different pubs, earning a total of about £20,000 a year.
'I'm quite a bit in debt and I just want to get it paid off really. I ran up the debts by just being an idiot.
'I really could do with the money. I told my mum about it and she said, 'Well, if it get's you a bit of money, it's a good idea.'
'The magazine story was saying about girls coming from Britain and going to America and selling their eggs. It just sounds like a good idea - easy money really - and it helps someone out.
'I'm using them so, if someone else can, it would be good and clear me out of a hole too.'
A change in the law last year means that, at the age of 18, a child born from donated eggs can be told who their biological mother is.
The lack of anonymity is putting off many potential donors.
In the UK, egg donors can only receive 'compensation' for expenses incurred which has also contributed to a shortage of voluntary donors.
Josephine Quintavalle, of Comment on Reproductive Ethics, said: 'The sort of money on offer in the US to egg donors is extremely tempting to some but I think at the very least women should be well informed about the risks.
'Egg donation is not like sperm donation. Women's eggs have to be harvested and the procedure can cause infertility, illness and even death.
'That is why people in the US pay such high prices for eggs because of the dangers involved.
'A young woman may think that getting £20,000 for her eggs is worth the risk. But then she might want children at 30 and find out she can't have them.
'Ironically, she then may have to pay the same amount for someone else's eggs.'
Do you know how easy it is to get in debt?? She is also very creative, brave and WANTS to pay off her debts ..not just go bankrupt and go on welfare. You need to get out in the real world.
Hey...Shallow Hal....What a bunch of SNOBS in here... I'd like to see what you and your spouse look like. How shallow.
"Hey...Shallow Hal....What a bunch of SNOBS in here... I'd like to see what you and your spouse look like. How shallow."
I'm not the one putting my face on the internet, selling my future children, and she's doing it on the basis of what? Certainly not intelligence. Talk about shallow. Why so defensive?
Two women (one in London and one in Dublin) are known to have died recently from complications associated with egg extraction.
snippet from:
http://www.handsoffourovaries.com/manifesto.htm
.........................
Pro-Abortion and Pro-Life Women Join Forces to End Exploitive Harvesting of Human Eggs
LifeSite.org ^ | March 15, 2006
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/mar/06031501.html
I don't like people making fun of people regarding their God given looks...
" don't like people making fun of people regarding their God given looks"
Making fun? You think "not altogether unpleasant" is making fun? I think you're entirely too upset. You've sold your eggs, haven't you?
when people try to sell souls, will eBay allow it?
It was your complete comment that I thought was shallow.
Never sold eggs....but if I was younger and saw how much they get ...I might have.
What qualities do you think complete strangers look for, when window shopping for human ova? I have to admit, I'm not as attuned as you appear to be, so do tell.
That's a personal decision by each....for me it would be Intelligence & Health....
Whatever excuse you're looking for to be shallow....go for it. I just hate to see it in a conservative forum and had to comment. I would expect something like that to be in DU.
You're one to talk. Go sell some children.
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