In today’s age, we are very fortunate to have an abundance of technological and medical advancements available to us. These advancements have increased the quality of life of many abled and disabled people. They often make the difference between life and death. But is it possible to have too much of a good thing? Is there enough ethical intervention and regularization in utilizing these advancements?

The medical model of disability focuses on finding cures for people’s disabilities, on making them more “normal”. A common, and often devastating, disability is infertility. Infertility is when a female cannot conceive, or when a male cannot impregnate their spouse. This kind of disability is subjective because some people may not find this as an inability. Regardless, the medicalization of infertility and pregnancy complications has come up with the technology of IVF and surrogacy. Where a female egg is taken and fertilized with the desired sperm outside of the body, then implanted into another female’s uterus to be carried. Undoubtedly, this procedure has brought joy and life to many families unable to conceive. But, some able-bodied people are capitalizing and taking advantage of this advancement simply for their convenience.

Firstly, I would like to consider accommodations for disabled people. Do all accommodations meant for disabled people need to be exclusively for disabled people? This isn’t a case of taking the ramp when you’re able enough to walk up the steps. This is not a case of using the bigger stall in the bathroom when you can use the regular stalls. This is a case of medical intervention which is meant to better a disadvantaged person but is abused by abled persons. This is a case of ableism and its new rise to ethical issues.

Although, there are regulations and guidelines set for pharmaceutical medical interventions for disabilities. Such as who can get Adderal prescribed and who cannot. People who truly need their prescriptions for behavioral disorders have to be questioned and interrogated even more, due to abled people taking advantage of these drugs. Ozempic is a really big issue in the news now. Celebrities who have connections with physicians buy this drug to conveniently lose weight when millions of individuals with diabetes need this drug to survive.

Yet, for surrogacy, there doesn’t seem to be any regulation for who is qualified and who is not. It’s a trend now, as casual as a new pair of shoes. A new procedure that is crucial for some, but casual for others is being over-utilized by high-class able-bodied people to keep them from experiencing the inconveniences of pregnancy. How does this affect disabled people or women as a whole? We learned about Marx’s views of organized labor and alienation. Surrogacy is becoming like a business transaction. You pick a healthy fertile female and use her body to carry your child, which is a product the surrogate creates but is not able to obtain or enjoy. The surrogate is alienated from her product faster than any other transaction. In most cases, the surrogate births the child, and it is taken from her and given to the mother of the child lying in the hospital bed next to the surrogate. This can be a beautiful heartwarming moment for couples who truly need this. But the beauty of this miracle is taken away when infertile couples need to wait months and even years due to the high demand for this process by abled body people.

The effect of ableism causing this phenomenon will also set back feminist movements. Although, it is often celebrity figures who take on a feminist character that abuses this procedure for their convenience. But there is nothing empowering about an able-bodied female not wanting to gain weight, go through hormonal changes, or all the difficulties of pregnancy and postpartum issues. But inflicting those permanent bodily and mental changes on another female in exchange for temporary fortune, out of convenience, is and should be unethical.