The Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection (MGCSP), is to develop a policy or a law to regulate the sale of sperms and fertilisation of eggs.
The move is to help bring sanity into the Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART) and Surrogacy industry in the country.
A Deputy Minister of Gender, Children and Social Protection, Mrs. Dela Sowah said this at the opening of the 2nd National Conference on Infertility and the launch of The Walking Egg method (TWE), an affordable Intro Vitro Fertilisation (IVT) treatment option in Accra on Saturday.
The method, introduced into Ghana, by the Association of Childless Couples of Ghana (ACCOG), is the first of its kind in Africa which cost about 20 per cent of the existing cost of IVF treatment.
The Walking Egg option would be made available to all Ghanaians for now, at the Pentecostal Hospital.
Mrs. Sowah encouraged Ghanaians to consider adopting abandoned children as an option to finding a lasting solution to their infertility needs.
Apostle Dr. Opoku Onyinah, Chairman of the Church of Pentecost, observed, that infertility has not been given the needed attention it deserves despite the numerous challenges confronting childless people in the country.
“Childlessness in Ghana puts so much stress and stigma on people , itcontributes to domestic violence, polygamy, sexually transmitted infections, divorce and even makes people commit suicide, hence the need for government to pay attention to issues of infertility” he said.
Apostle Onyinah appealed to government not to delay with its intention to develop a policy to regulate the ART industry saying, this is the key thing we can do as a nation to help people living with infertility.
The development of the policy he believed, would help bring to justice some practitioners who apply the methods wrongly, and put the lives of some citizens at risk.
The Chief Executive Officer of the ACCOG, Nana Yaw Osei for his part, thanked the Pentecost Hospital and the Walking Egg, a non governmental organisation in Belgium for their collaborative effort to bring the affordable IVF solution to the doorsteps of Ghanaians living with infertility.
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