Advertisements for ultrasound clinics that appear in Canadian Punjabi newspapers are promoting abortion of female foetuses among Indo-Canadians, the head of an immigrant society has alleged.
Charan Gill of the Progressive Intercultural Community Services Society in British Columbia (BC) province alleged that ultrasound clinics were promoting female infanticides.
Gill says he is shocked that ads for ultrasound clinics are running in two Punjabi-language newspapers, the Ajit Weekly, based in Mississauga, Ontario and the Hamdard Weekly, published weekly from Toronto, New York, Vancouver and California, and Chandigarh.
The papers are distributed across Canada.
One ad provides BC Phone numbers, including a line for Punjabi speakers, for anyone wanting to make appointments at Koala Labs, an ultrasound clinic in Blaine, Washington.
It reads, "You are told the sex immediately."
"It's really, really sad that some newspapers, for sake of money, are misleading the public. The end result is they will tell the sex of the baby so that people that don't want baby girls can abort it," Canadian Broadcasting Corporation quoted Gill as saying.
Dr Stephen Jones, who runs the Koala clinic in Washington, said there's no proof of how couples are using ultrasound data. But an Ottawa-based family rights group said statistics suggest abortions targeting female foetuses are happening in BC's Indo-Canadian community.
{{/usCountry}}Dr Stephen Jones, who runs the Koala clinic in Washington, said there's no proof of how couples are using ultrasound data. But an Ottawa-based family rights group said statistics suggest abortions targeting female foetuses are happening in BC's Indo-Canadian community.
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