Infertility, IVF & Surrogacy: psychology & legality

This month's show focuses on assisted reproduction, and the legal and psychological implications. Ben and Heather talk to Miranda Montrone, a Sydney based psychologist who specialises in counselling in infertility and assisted reproduction. One in six couples in Australia and New Zealand suffer infertility, and of course, a growing number of same sex couples and single women are choosing to have children. So it's not surprising that many people that 1 in 25 Australian babies is not born via IVF. The percentage for surrogacy is smaller, yet it still accounts for an estimated 300 Australian births a year. Miranda Montrone is a practicing psychologist with over 30 years experience counselling in infertility, IVF and surrogacy. She is considered the pre-eminent expert in this field. As well as her ongoing counselling work with clients, Miranda has written a number of papers on IVF and surrogacy, presented at conferences for both health professionals and family lawyers, and provided advice to Parliament when they were drafting the 2010 NSW Surrogacy Act.