Pregnant lesbian denied hospital care in Japan

An LGBTQ advocacy group in Japan has called on the Government to guarantee care for all pregnant women after a lesbian who obtained IVF abroad was denied routine care.

Advocacy group, Tokyo-based Kodomap, made the request to the Children and Families Agency and asked the Government to ensure that obstetric care will be accessible to every pregnant woman regardless of marital status or sexual orientation.

'It is unacceptable that hospitals deny examinations just because the woman is from a sexual minority or has used a donated sperm,' said Satoko Nagamura, a representative of Kodomap, Japan Times reported.

The hospital ethics committee decided to not provide obstetric care to the pregnant woman, when it decided her situation was 'unprecedented' after reviewing her case. Kodomap also highlighted another recent case where a single woman who was planning to raise her child conceived via IVF alone, was blocked from accessing pregnancy care by her hospital.

IVF can only be accessed by heterosexual married couples in Japan, and there is a lack of legislation surrounding sperm donation in the country. This has meant some individuals and couples have travelled abroad to receive fertility treatment.

The Government has since responded with plans to send letters to hospitals to avoid similar cases occurring again. Koji Takahashi, the official at the Children and Families Agency who received the request, said: 'Regardless of how she got pregnant, there should not be a case where an obstetrics department refuses to examine a pregnant woman,' Japan Times reported.

A cross-party group of lawmakers published a revised draft of planned legislation concerning donor gametes, in November 2023, updating a draft first published in March 2022. This legislation is the first of its kind in the country, which introduced its first law concerning parenthood for children born following fertility treatment in December 2020.

The planned legislation will continue to restrict access to donor gametes and IVF to infertile, heterosexual married couples, and will not cover surrogacy. Recently added revisions to the draft include the right for donor-conceived people to access non-identifying information about their donor, upon reaching adulthood. This information will be collected and held by Japan's National Centre for Child Health and Development for 100 years, under planned legislation.

It is expected the bill will be passed next year.