Bias before birth: sex-selective practices and their consequences

Holy See’s position on sex-selective practices and their consequences

In 2025, the global community marked  the thirtieth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women and the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (1995).

To celebrate it, the sixty-ninth session of the Commission on the Status of Women took  place at United Nations Headquarters in New York from 10 to 21 March 2025.

On 13 March 2025, Professor Gabriella Gambino, Under-Secretary of the Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life and Head of the Holy See Delegation, delivered a speech on “Bias before birth: sex-selective practices and their consequences. Beijing’s Unfinished Business“.

Professor Gabriella Gambino addressed the UN side event highlighting the grave issue of sex-selective practices against girls as a violation of human dignity and equality. Marking the anniversary of the Beijing Declaration, she reaffirmed the commitment to eliminate all forms of discrimination and violence against women. Despite international condemnation, these practices, including pre-implantation selection, selective abortions, and infanticide, persist globally, potentially leading to a deficit of millions of women and girls.

Professor Gambino emphasized that these practices stem from cultural and spiritual roots in prejudice and injustice, echoing Pope Francis’s words. She equated the selective killing of women to feminicide. The speech underscored the ethical and legal issues, as such practices deny the fundamental right to life from conception. Access to modern reproductive technologies and legal abortion were identified as major contributors to this problem.

Furthermore, Professor Gambino stated that there is no legal right to a child that can justify the suppression of life, especially before and after birth. Prenatal sex selection and infanticide are heinous acts against motherhood, rooted in a mentality that treats human beings as objects. She called for a universal ban on all forms of sex-selective practices and urged a re-evaluation of laws that have liberalized abortion. Drawing on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, she affirmed the inherent dignity of every human being from the first moment of existence. Professor Gambino concluded by referencing Pope Francis’s call for a “diplomacy of Hope” that defends the right to life from conception.

Images

• Photo by  Colin Lloyd su Unsplash

Sources

• Prof. Gabriella Gambino: Speech to Side-event at UN (March 13th, 2025) – YouTube Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life Channel
• Prof. Gambino speech (AI supported transcription)