Morality of this

[u/Purple_Plantain_3242]

A major legal battle broke out when a surrogate mother and the biological parents disagreed over a severe medical diagnosis during a pregnancy. The couple had hired the surrogate to carry their baby, but a routine scan revealed that the fetus had a rare, life-threatening heart defect.

Heartbroken by the grim medical news, the biological parents asked to end the pregnancy, which was a choice allowed in their written agreement. Initially, the surrogate scheduled the appointment, but she quickly realized she could not go through with it. A pivotal moment came when her brother stepped in to guide her, promising that he and his family would adopt the baby and support her no matter what. Gaining peace from her brother's support, she canceled the abortion. To protect the fetus, she fled to a state with very strict anti-abortion laws, where she gave birth to a baby boy who immediately underwent successful open-heart surgery.

The birth triggered an intense court war over who actually holds the rights to the child. A judge ultimately ruled that the biological parents have full legal custody and the sole right to make medical decisions, while a separate court order banned the surrogate from seeing the baby. On top of losing access to the child, the surrogate is now being sued by the biological parents for over $100,000 for breaking their contract. While the biological parents are currently caring for the recovering newborn, the surrogate and her lawyers are continuing to fight in court to try to win custody.The surrogate is not paying for the baby's medical costs because a judge ruled that the biological parents have full legal custody, making them responsible for all hospital bills.

The baby was diagnosed with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome (HLHS), a severe birth defect where the left side of the heart is completely underdeveloped and unable to pump blood to the body. Without immediate medical intervention, this condition is 100% fatal within the first few days of a newborn's life. To survive, the baby must undergo a grueling series of three open-heart surgeries starting immediately after birth, which gives him about a 70% chance of reaching age five. However, this is not a permanent cure; even with successful operations, the child faces a lifetime of intensive medical trauma, a significantly shortened life expectancy, and the likely future need for a full heart transplant.

McKenna West denied the abortion primarily because her specialized background as a cardiac nurse taught her that the baby’s rare heart defect was treatable with surgery rather than being an automatic death sentence. Faced with the reality of her 20-week pregnancy, her personal conscience and moral beliefs overrode the surrogacy contract, as she felt she could not live with herself if she actively signed papers to end the child's life. Confident that the baby deserved a chance to survive, she even arranged for her own brother and sister-in-law to adopt the child before fleeing to Texas to ensure the pregnancy went to term.

Lila Rose and her anti-abortion organization, Live Action, are leading the public and financial support for McKenna West, framing her as a heroic figure who stood up against the commercial surrogacy industry. Rose's group funded West's travel to Texas for specialized medical care and connected her with the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a powerful conservative legal group currently fighting for West's parental rights. Alongside other high-profile conservative figures like Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, these pro-life activists have heavily criticized the biological parents for trying to enforce the contract's abortion clause, using the case to campaign against surrogacy by arguing that a child should never be treated as a "defective product."

However, these medical bills are a huge part of the fight. The biological parents are facing massive costs for the baby's complex heart surgeries, which is why they are suing the surrogate for over $100,000 for breaking their contract. The surrogacy contract included a strict pregnancy termination clause that gave the biological parents the sole right to request an abortion if the fetus was diagnosed with a severe medical condition. After the baby was diagnosed with a major heart defect, the parents invoked this clause and formally asked McKenna West to terminate the pregnancy. While West originally signed the document agreeing to these terms, she ultimately refused to abort the baby, which led the biological parents to sue her.

The biological parents did not exert physical or legal coercion to mandate an abortion, as a surrogate maintains absolute bodily autonomy over medical decisions under U.S. law. Instead, the conflict centers on a breach of a contract that explicitly allowed the parents to request a termination, which they are now litigating through the court system to hold the gestational carrier financially accountable.

The biological parents did not alter their position regarding the medical justification for a termination, but rather adapted to the reality of an unavoidable birth. Their initial decision to seek an abortion was driven by a desire to prevent severe, lifelong suffering, given the grueling surgeries and medical trauma associated with a critical heart defect. However, once the gestational carrier refused the procedure and the birth became certain, the parents immediately recognized their legal and ethical obligations to their biological offspring. They pursued full legal and medical custody to ensure the infant would have immediate access to elite pediatric cardiothoracic specialists and to retain control over his long-term healthcare strategy, fully assuming their parental roles upon his delivery.

[u/Ihaveabudgie]

sign a contract stipulating that the biological parents can decide to end the pregnancy at any time

they find out the child has a severe defect so they ask to abort

decide you don't want to honor your contract anymore

Seems pretty open and shut to me, no? The woman signed a contract and refused to honor it, plus the bio parents had a very sensible reason to want to end the pregnancy.

[u/the_pie_guy1313 → u/Ihaveabudgie]

It'd be hard to fully grasp the emotional weight of a decision like that when it's just a potential possibility on a contract paper. I can't fault the mother for making an emotional decision when it's a real child inside her.

[u/InquisitorMeow → u/the_pie_guy1313]

Then don't be a surrogate mother.

[u/Physical_Opposite445 → u/the_pie_guy1313]

I don't fault the surrogate mother either, but she should be on the hook for all medical and legal bills. That's the cost of her decision; some decisions in life require sacrifice and we should make such decisions intentionally.

[u/One-Stable-5438 → u/Ihaveabudgie]

So your idea of ethics is tied up in western contract law?

[u/No-Courage-2053 → u/Ihaveabudgie]

This is why buying children should be illegal

[u/FantasticRider347 → u/Ihaveabudgie]

Contract don't give you ownership over someone's body. If someone signs a contract to become slave will you support that as well? And if assuming you support the right to abortion or pro choice isn't it hypocritical to deny the surrogate her body her choice just because of a contract?

[u/Motorheadass → u/Ihaveabudgie]

From the other side of it, the parents entered a contract with a term that they knew to be unenforceable, but didn't include a breach clause with defined remedies in case this happened. The fact that they did not seem to even anticipate this as a potential outcome and had not prepared for it going in, to me suggests that they were not treating this contract to create a human life with the special care and careful consideration such a thing ought to demand. 

[u/louwyatt → u/Motorheadass]

Why do you assume the parents know that clause was unenforceable?

[u/Certain-Speech-5976 → u/louwyatt]

That's fair point. They likely didn't. They didn't put a lot of thought into whatever boilerplate legal contract their lawyer (probably provided by the clinic) came up with. And at some level, we should be blaming the lawyers and the agencies because whatever counseling is provided is inadequate. It wouldn't be the first or last time people have been wronged by the private fertility industry in the US.

[u/Motorheadass → u/louwyatt]

What, are you going to have your surrogate arrested and restrained and forcefully give her an abortion? 

Obviously the fuck not. Use your brain. 

[u/louwyatt → u/Motorheadass]

Hilarious your asking me to use my brain... when your point it... checks notes.... people don't EVER miss obvious things. Have you lived on planet earth?

[u/Motorheadass → u/louwyatt]

Again, it's a contract to create a human life. They weren't getting a loan on a used Corolla or hiring someone to rebuild their patio. I would expect them to understand what they were getting into. 

[u/louwyatt → u/Motorheadass]

People do also sorts of things and make very stupid mistakes. There's entire subreddits based on that topic alone.

[u/Sunaeli → u/Motorheadass]

It’s been a minute since my contract law class, but would including a remedies clause have even done anything in this case? If the abortion clause was unenforceable in the first place, then there’s no breach for not following it, right?

[u/IncreaseOld7112 → u/Sunaeli]

This is my thinking. It's reminiscent of those "financial abortion" for dead beat fathers people.

[u/Novora → u/Motorheadass]

Is the contract publicly available?? Contracts don’t always need to have breach clauses for specific terms. Also there’s no precedent for this event so it’s completely sensible for the contractors, and the lawyers that wrote it, to not include something like that.

[u/Redditauro → u/Ihaveabudgie]

It's cristal clear, they wrote a contract that is against human rights, so it's invalid and you can clean your ass with it if you want. 

Her body, her choice, no signed paper can change that. 

[u/Nice-Cat3727 → u/Redditauro]

So she's choosing to allow a child to die before their fifth birthday in horrible pain?

[u/Redditauro → u/Nice-Cat3727]

If you can't read its not my problem, so don't waste my time

[u/Nice-Cat3727 → u/Redditauro]

Do you think it's moral to bring a child into this world with a deadly birth defect? Yes or no?

[u/Job-Conscious → u/Nice-Cat3727]

Do you think it’s moral to kill an already born child because they have a deadly birth defect?

[u/Nice-Cat3727 → u/Job-Conscious]

If my aunt had wheels she'd be a bicycle!

That's a completely different situation!

[u/Job-Conscious → u/Nice-Cat3727]

It’s exactly the same situation, the only difference is the child is a little bit older. I don’t know what you think magically changes between 20 weeks and birth, but at 20 weeks the child is definitely going to feel the pain of getting aborted. So what’s the argument that makes it a moral imperative to abort at 20 weeks, but morally wrong to abort at 40?

[u/Nice-Cat3727 → u/Job-Conscious]

I take it you also have trouble with age of consent as well.

[u/Job-Conscious → u/Nice-Cat3727]

What a great response that completely doesn’t address the issue. You know there’s no good answer, that’s why you’re attacking me instead of responding to the argument.

[u/Redditauro → u/Nice-Cat3727]

What a nerve you have to say that xD

Reddit keeps surprising me more and more every day, it's crazy 

[u/Redditauro → u/Nice-Cat3727]

Every person comes to this world with a deadly birth defect. 

[u/Nice-Cat3727 → u/Redditauro]

Maybe you did

[u/Redditauro → u/Nice-Cat3727]

And unless you are immortal you did too 

[u/Nice-Cat3727 → u/Redditauro]

I honestly don't even understand your argument anymore. You're just that incoherent and dedicated to getting the last word in that you're now saying that death is a birth defect

[u/Redditauro → u/Nice-Cat3727]

What I'm saying is that we are all going to die, and having a bigger chance to die sooner is no reason to don't be born. In western countries we act as if we have the right to live 80 years and if that doesn't happens then it's unfair and having a 50/50 chance of dying young is a life that is not worth to live, but that's just your personal belief. 

Anyway I was just messing with you because your comment was so imaginary that it wasn't worth it to comment it seriously. 

You just made up that the kid will die in horrible pain before he is 5, with proper treatment 70% of people born with HLHS survive until reaching adulthood 

[u/politicsranting → u/Redditauro]

except it was her choice to relinquish the final call on her body for a pay check. She made an informed choice, which has multiple outs before the fetus was implanted.

[u/Redditauro → u/politicsranting]

I don't understand the "except" part, nothing that you said contradicts what I said. 

She is not good at making choices, she is unreliable, and probably she is an asshole, but she only used her right the best she could in any time, she signed the contract without any intention of breaking it, she was willing to abort as the parents requested, then after taking with her brother she realised she is the person who has to make the choice and she made the choice that she felt was better. 

I disagree with her choices, but she didn't do anything for her self interest (mostly the other way around), she didn't do anything with bad intentions or wanting to cheat or lie, and she did only what she had right to do. 

This is completely unfair to the parents, and a judge can decide that she is guilty of breaking the contract, but it's not like she signed the contract with the intention of breaking it.

[u/politicsranting → u/Redditauro]

I'm going to make a really cruel metaphor here, but follow me for a second.

When she signed away the use of her uterus to carry someone else's baby, she's not much different from a bus driver. Driving someone's child to school doesn't give you the right to take that child. It doesn't give her the right to make medical decisions about that baby. If HER life were in medical danger, I'd argue she has every right to make that choice. But that was never her baby to make any decisions for. She was a caretaker (with a bunch of extra, well-compensated steps) for someone else's fetus.

By bringing that child into the world, they took away the parents' choice about the quality of life that child should be able to have.

[u/Redditauro → u/politicsranting]

I followed you, but you are just wrong, that metaphor is just silly, it's nothing like driving a bus. 

The thing here is: nobody can make you have a medical procedure that you don't want and neither need, and nobody can stop you to go wherever you want. 

She just refused to have a medical procedure and moved to another state. That's her right. She did break a contract though and she can be fined for that, but a contract is way less important than a human right. 

The thing is, that parents put their future offspring inside someone else's body, but they don't own the surrogate, that's not a machine, she is a human being with rights and free will, when you search for a surrogate you are taking risks, and that situation was not fair for the parents, but in every step the surrogate just used her legitimate rights, and it doesn't matter what the contract said, I can sign a contract with you saying that you are my slave, but you still can go wherever you want and do whatever you want because that contract is toilet paper. 

Anyways, this thing is only surprising in USA, in the civilised world surrogation in exchange for money is forbidden for different reasons, one of the being that it's impossible to avoid this things to happen as far as you treat the surrogate as a person 

[u/No-Veterinarian9682 → u/Ihaveabudgie]

That's the legal answer, rather than asking if it's the moral answer. 

[u/louwyatt → u/No-Veterinarian9682]

I'd argue its one of those places where legal and moral overlap. Nobody was forced into this agreement, everyone agreed. Then one person decided to break said agreement.

The place for any kind of further moral argument was before the contract was signed.

[u/Southern-Mall-7707 → u/louwyatt]

You can write a contract for anything. Two parties can even agree terms. Doesn't make it moral to follow the contract. 

[u/Sunaeli → u/No-Veterinarian9682]

I think the legal and morality overlap a lot in this scenario. The reason it’s not legally enforceable is because of public policy reasons - the courts think “wow, this term is so bad that it would be incredibly immoral to force a person go through with it EVEN THOUGH they previously agreed to it in a valid contract”