Actress Blacklisted for Hiring Surrogate Mothers

Popular Chinese actress Zheng Shuang has been embroiled in a career-ending scandal after her husband publicly accused her of abandoning him and their two children born of two hired surrogate mothers in the US. In a Sina Weibo post on January 18, husband Zhang Heng said he and their infant children may be unable to return to China after their visas expire as Zheng did not sign the relevant paperwork. Zhang also posted an audio clip of a conversation between Zheng and Zhang’s parents when the couple wanted to split in October 2019 that suggested Zheng had planned to abandon the children when the two surrogate mothers were seven and eight months pregnant. While surrogacy is banned in China, some companies illegally arrange these services. Many netizens called surrogacy a way for rich people to exploit poorer ones and called on the government to tighten supervision and increase punishment for surrogacy. Amid the public outcry, China’s entertainment industry watchdog publicly announced that it would not give any celebrity with a record of “misconduct” the opportunity to appear on stage or screen.