In China, nationwide legislation doesn’t explicitly ban single individuals from companies like fertility remedies, and easily states {that a} “husband and spouse” can have as much as three youngsters. In apply, nonetheless, hospitals and different establishments implement the rules in a approach that requires individuals to indicate a wedding license. Single ladies who select to have youngsters have struggled to entry public advantages like maternity go away or protection for prenatal exams.

In 2018, Xu, then 30 years outdated, had gone to Beijing Obstetrics and Gynecology Hospital at Capital Medical College, a public hospital, to ask about freezing her eggs. After an preliminary examination, she was advised she couldn’t proceed additional as a result of she couldn’t present a wedding certificates. She mentioned the physician additionally urged her to have a baby whereas she was nonetheless younger.

Xu, who’s single, had needed to protect her eggs so she might have an choice to bear youngsters at a later date.

“I believe this misplaced lawsuit, it’s not an assault on single ladies’s reproductive rights, possibly it’s a short lived setback,” she mentioned in a brief video assertion asserting the information on her WeChat account.

Xu’s case drew broad protection from home media shops in China, together with some state media shops, when she first introduced her case to court docket in 2019. Native media had mentioned her case in opposition to the hospital was the nation’s first.

The hospital, in response to the judgment, had argued that egg freezing poses sure well being dangers. However it additionally mentioned that delaying being pregnant would result in “issues” corresponding to dangers to the mom throughout being pregnant, and “psychological and societal issues” if there’s a giant age hole between mother and father and their baby.

The hospital additionally mentioned that egg-freezing companies have been solely obtainable to ladies who couldn’t get pregnant within the pure approach, and never for wholesome sufferers.

Xu mentioned she plans to attraction the ruling.

“There will certainly be a day (when) we’ll take again sovereignty over our personal our bodies,” she mentioned.