Searching for the Stork

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It's hard to be against motherhood, but Japan, a country with a falling birthrate, may have found a way. When television variety-show host Aki Mukai and her husband, former professional wrestler Nobuhiko Takada, announced the birth of their twin boys last Tuesday, they drew fresh attention to the country's restrictive law surrounding surrogate mothers. Due to a 41-year-old Supreme Court ruling, Mukai, 39, can't be registered as the twins' biological mother, because the couple used a surrogate to give birth; to be recognized, she must legally adopt the twins.

Mukai, whose bout with cervical cancer three years ago left her unable to bear children, has been a prominent crusader against the stigma Japanese society attaches to infertile couples. Her and her husband's struggle to become parents was the subject of a TV documentary, and their story has been adapted as a TV drama, both of which were broadcast earlier this year. "I want women to know that if the stork doesn't come to them, they can go search for their stork," Mukai said last year.

Despite technological advances that make surrogacy safer and more reliable, Japan's conservative health-care establishment remains against it, partly out of fear that some women might become for-profit baby factories. "For safety and welfare reasons, the human body should not be used as a tool for reproduction," said Tomoko Kashiwagi of the Health Ministry. The Japan Society of Obstetrics and Gynecology opposes the practice in part due to the potential for "complication of family relationships." The ministry, meanwhile, is pushing for an outright ban. Women with reproductive dysfunction, says Kashiwagi, may simply "have to give up on biological children."