Surrogate babies 'as happy as others'

Children born through a surrogate pregnancy are as emotionally stable and as happy as their peers in later life, new research suggests. According to a study from Cambridge University, children conceived through surrogacy, egg donation or artificial insemination have a positive relationship with their families. Scientists asked children from 39 surrogacy families, 43 insemination families, 46 egg donation families and 70 families who experienced natural conception to rate their happiness and relationships with their parents.

It was found that there were no significant differences between the children involved in the research.

Children were asked to draw a family map to describe their family relationships – 85 per cent of assisted children born through assisted pregnancy placed their mother in the closest circle to themselves, compared to 88 per cent of those conceived naturally.

"We found that the family types did not differ in the overall quality of the relationship between mothers and their children and fathers and their children," said Polly Casey from the university's Centre for Family Research.

The research found that 89 per cent of parents who experienced a surrogate pregnancy had told their child about their conception by the time of their seventh birthday.