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Paper short abstract:

This article is the result of an ethnography conducted in Spain and the United Kingdom. It analyses the relationship between: the use of reproductive medicine as a business, the role played by assisted-reproduction-clinics, their marketing strategies, and the experiences of women as patients.

Paper long abstract:

This article is the result of an ethnography conducted in Spain and the United Kingdom. Its purpose is to analyse the relationship between: a) the use of reproductive medicine as a business, b) the role played by assisted reproduction clinics and their marketing strategies, and c) the experiences of women as patients/clients. This study focuses on women who decided to procreate on their own using assisted reproductive technologies (ART). Some of them travelled internationally to leading reproductive destinations because of waiting lists, donor availability, success rates, cost, donors´ anonymity or embryos available to transfer, and some of them imported gametes. Reproductive treatment is not only a physiological endeavour, it is also a psychological one: struggling to conceive, exploring options presented by a fertility clinic, uncertainty about choosing a donor, suffering as a result of not conceiving with her own eggs, a miscarriage or pregnancy loss, clinics’ promises of treatment success, the economic cost, fear, and judgements by society, friends, family and sometimes oneself. Despite the fact that the literature on mental health has established that psychological support is necessary in reproductive treatment, none of the women interviewed was offered this support. Some of the participants had to pay psychology, coaching or alternative medicine professionals to alleviate the suffering that the treatment caused them. However, both public and private health care and all the industries involved in ART profit from the vast amount of money that the fertility business produces in both countries, ignoring the needs of patients.