How women are recruited into the international human egg trade business

Credit: STAT News
Credit: STAT News

Young women are recruited into the global egg trade through shrewd emotional marketing techniques and a skillful manipulation of their emotions during the process, according to research published in the journal Gender, Work and Organization. Coauthors Diane Tober, at the University of California San Francisco, and Charlotte Krolokke, at the University of Southern Denmark, in Odense, describe an addictive formula that combines an appeal to altruism with the lure of money and foreign adventure, while playing down the realities of egg donation.

Step one: frame egg donation in just the right way.

Very often, that first impression takes place online. Instagram, Facebook, Spotify, Twitter and other platforms serve up ads targeted specifically to young women, especially those with financial stresses like student debt. Sometimes women find themselves reading egg donation websites after searching phrases like “easy ways to make money.”

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Step two: reinforce that what she’s doing is amazing.

After the donor expresses interest, she gets a response. What she’s doing, she’s told, is a really amazing thing. Egg donors are so badly needed! Fill out the paperwork, go through the preliminary screenings, and let’s get started.

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