China’s Struggle with Population Decline and Reproductive Rights
In the face of a declining population, China’s leadership has implemented various strategies to encourage women to have more children. However, one significant measure remains out of reach: allowing unmarried women the option to freeze their eggs. This week, a Beijing court reaffirmed a longstanding regulation that restricts egg freezing procedures solely to married women.
Advocates for women’s rights argue that this policy is discriminatory, as it effectively denies single women access to a reproductive option that would enable them to delay childbirth while pursuing their careers or personal goals. The ruling stems from a legal battle initiated by Teresa Xu, who took her case to court after a doctor at an obstetrics hospital refused her request for egg freezing services, instead advising her to marry and start a family as soon as possible.
On Wednesday, Ms. Xu revealed that the Chaoyang Intermediate People’s Court in Beijing had dismissed her lawsuit, leaving her with no further legal recourse after a six-year struggle for reproductive autonomy. The court maintained that her rights had not been infringed.
In a livestream video following the ruling, Ms. Xu, a 36-year-old freelance writer residing in Guangzhou, expressed her disappointment yet noted that she had anticipated the outcome. “I was mentally prepared for it,” she stated in the livestream, which she later shared across her social media platforms. “This result wasn’t all that unexpected.”
In China, the ruling Communist Party maintains considerable control over reproductive policies, dictating who can have children and the number of children permitted. Historically, the government enforced a strict one-child policy, which was only relaxed in response to a significant decrease in birth rates. In recent years, this policy evolved to allow families to have two and then three children in an effort to combat the looming demographic crisis.
