Photo: First-ever surrogate baby in Vietnam born today...

A 46-year-old woman, whose identity has not
been released, on Friday, January 22, gave
birth to the first-ever Vietnamese surrogate baby
at a hospital in Hanoi.
The baby girl, weighing 3.6kg, was born by C-
section, performed by Deputy Minister of Health,
Professor and Doctor Nguyen Viet Tien (pictured
carrying the newborn baby today) when the
surrogate mother was 38 weeks pregnant.
"We had been waiting for this moment for ages
and this made us burst with happiness," Nguyen
Thi Ha, the real mother of the newborn, was
quoted by newswire VnExpress as saying.
Ha and her husband have been married for 18
years and she was diagnosed infertile three years
into their marriage.
In March 2015, Vietnam legalized surrogate
pregnancy as it revised the Law on Marriage and
Family, and the couple, based in the northern
province of Ha Nam, would never miss such a
precious chance.
They filed a surrogacy request at the National
Hospital of Obstetrics and Gynecology in Hanoi,
and eventually received the go-ahead to have one
of her aunts to be the surrogate mother for the
baby they longed to have .
The birth of the very first surrogate baby in
Vietnam is a significant milestone for families
who cannot have natural or IVF children, Deputy
Minister Tien told the media after the C-section
surgery.
Minister of Health Nguyen Thi Kim Tien is also
expected to visit the newborn baby later today.
There are some 100 surrogacy requests eligible
for approval in Vietnam, and nearly 30 surrogate
babies are expected to enter the world in the next
three months, according to VnExpress.