关注

Behind the rusted iron gate, what kind of human business is hidden? In a seemingly ordinary three-story farmhouse in Changsha's Chunhua Town, over 10 unlicensed vans enter and exit daily. Vehicles with windows covered in black film come and go, unloading batches of pale-faced young women and taking away postpartum mothers wrapped in blankets. This underground transaction lasted for a full 83 days, until villagers reported it, tearing apart the facade — this gray and white small building operated a complete underground 'pregnancy industry chain': upstairs for pregnancy preparation and delivery, downstairs for frozen embryos, and the basement for centralized accommodation.

This is not an isolated case. In the first half of 2023 alone, there were 39 illegal pregnancy cases investigated in the Changsha region, but practitioners remain rampant, openly soliciting clients on short video platforms with coded language: 'Hiring caring mothers, all meals and accommodation provided, 100,000 compensation for 45 days.' The chat records in pregnancy intermediary groups are shocking: a 200,000 package offers 'custom twins', 500,000 can specify gender, and some even crazily launch 'renting a womb without renting an egg' premium services. During a covert investigation, a seasoned journalist discovered that black clinics often concentrate pregnant mothers in farmhouses or buildings awaiting demolition, using 'dedicated meal delivery + live monitoring' prison-like management to ensure the transaction is completed.

The temptation of huge profits has made the illegal chain increasingly hidden. Sister Li, who has worked at a maternity center in Changsha for seven years, revealed that intermediaries now use phrases like 'tourist pick-up' and 'booking homestays': 'Pregnant women traveling by high-speed train will specifically sit in separate carriages, and after arriving, they will uniformly switch to local license plate private cars. The most exaggerated case involved four different colored ride-hailing cars consecutively picking up six pregnant mothers.' At the same time, legal enforcement is caught in a dilemma: during one law enforcement process, the pregnant mothers who should have been protected instead surrounded the police, crying, 'If I don't do this, how will I support my brother's schooling?'

Sociologists pointed out the deadly cycle of pregnancy issues: the dowry customs of 'selling daughters' in certain underdeveloped areas indirectly lead families to need illegal pregnancies to give birth to boys; the difficulty of obtaining appointments at top-tier hospitals' reproductive departments drives middle-class families to underground clinics; and some beauty institutions collude with black intermediaries, pushing young girls who cannot repay cosmetic loans into the abyss of pregnancy.

When the heavy iron gate of the village building closes, both inside and outside are experiencing a deep tug-of-war between humanity and reality. This seemingly consensual transaction is, in fact, a brutal reflection of the entire social security system's dysfunction.