Bulgarian women among exploited as surrogate mothers in a massive criminal scheme in Greece

A scandal involving illegal adoptions, egg donation and bogus in vitro procedures has erupted in Greece this week. Dozens of women have been exploited by a criminal group as surrogate mothers and egg donors, including Bulgarians.

On 8 August, Greek police disrupted the organised crime group, which included doctors and other medical professionals. The operation was carried out in Crete, Athens and Thessaloniki.

Local media described the scheme as a "birth factory" and the "industrialisation of births" at the In Vitro Fertilisation Centre in Chania, Crete. The leader of the criminal group was a 73-year-old gynaecologist, the founder and manager of the clinic. Together with a 44-year-old embryologist, he recruited "intermediaries" in Crete, Thessaloniki, and abroad to locate and obtain consent from vulnerable foreign women, transfer them to Greece, and exploit them as egg donors or surrogate mothers.

Through the exploitation of women, the orders of "clients" from all over the world (couples with reproductive problems, single men or homosexual couples) who did not fulfil the legal prerequisites for adoption were fulfilled.

The women were then either subjected to special therapy as egg donors for in vitro fertilization and surrogacy programmes, or they were placed in facilities controlled by the criminal organization to spend their pregnancies. They then handed over the newborns for a fee. In some cases, before the women were used as surrogates, they were further exploited as egg donors.

In the cases of interested parents from countries where childbirth through surrogacy was prohibited, the births were declared as adoptions. Members of the criminal group acted as intermediaries in adoptions for a fee and also systematically deceived women into believing that they had undergone an embryo transfer procedure (transfer of the embryo to the expectant mother in in vitro fertilization).

Among those arrested were the "intermediaries" who were responsible for supervising and housing the exploited women, and one of them was also in charge of finding childless and homosexual couples, mostly from Italy, willing to have a child.

Among those detained were the "middlewomen" who were responsible for supervising and housing the exploited women, and one of them was also responsible for finding childless and homosexual couples, mostly from Italy, who wanted to have a child.

The organization is believed to have been active for a decade. Since December 2022 alone, it has identified at least 71 women egg donors, some of whom have been repeatedly exploited; 98 women exploited as surrogates; 13 cases of illegal child acquisition through a surrogacy programme; 4 illegal adoptions; 400 cases of fraud and causing physical harm to female patients through fictitious in vitro procedures in 2021, 2022 and 2023.

Police reported that during the operation, 30 foreign women who were either egg donors or pregnant surrogate mothers were found in various homes in Chania. They have since been provided with psychological and other support by the Greek state and a non-governmental organization.

Local media described the housing in Chania as 'holes'. The 30 women found in them were from Moldova, Ukraine, Georgia, Romania and Bulgaria. They had serious financial problems when members of the criminal group contacted them to persuade them to become surrogate mothers. When they arrived, they were placed under constant surveillance. They were only allowed to go out to the supermarket or for medical tests at the In Vitro Fertilisation Centre. The women were paid around 600 euros per month.

The "industrial" scale of the operation is illustrated by the case of one of the exploited women, who had six children and became a surrogate mother twice. A couple who almost fell victim to the group told a local television station about the huge sums of money they were asked to pay to have a child or even just to have an embryo transfer.

“The "price" is 70,000 euros to get a "finished" baby. We found out that ready fertilized eggs for parents unable to fertilize their own cost 7,000 – 9,000 euros. Then we began to think that our first embryo transfer was a sham and that our two fertilized eggs had become object of trade," the witness says.

Because of the case, Greek Health Minister Michalis Chrysochoidis dismissed the head of the Hellenic National Authority for Medically Assisted Reproduction, Nikolaos Vrahnis.

Before being dismissed, Vrachnis told media that his office was in continuous contact with the deputy scientific head of the centre in Crete and the rest of the staff, to take the necessary measures to preserve the genetic material from patients, which is kept frozen in the cryogenic bank in Chania. He also assured that all the medical procedures under development would be completed.

Vrachnis also said that since May 2021, when the supervisory board of the National Service was established, no complaints have been received against the IVF centre in Chania.

Source: BTA