A woman who says she runs a charity is offering a baby for 3 billion rials (about $1,100). The offer includes everything from ultrasound scans to a birth certificate and national ID, with the cash due after the handover.
Ads like hers are circulating on Iranian social media despite a legal ban on the sale of children.
Brokers on Telegram channels are using the language of charity and adoption to ask for sums running into billions of rials, according to an RFE/RL Radio Farda investigation based on a review of the channels and interviews with activists, nurses, and the brokers themselves.
Some go further, offering to register a baby's birth in the name of a woman who is not its biological mother. Others arrange placements with Iranian families living abroad.
A nurse familiar with such deals told Radio Farda that 3 billion rials is considered "a reasonable price for a baby."
A 'Gift' For A Baby Boy
One Telegram channel that raises money for vulnerable women and children posted an appeal for a woman in the eighth month of pregnancy who had allegedly been evicted from her home. The appeal soon turned into an offer: her baby, for 1.5 billion rials (about $550) plus hospital costs.
The channel's administrator, who calls herself "The Doctor," told Radio Farda she places abandoned newborns with adoptive families.
“I would rather the babies go to families than to Behzisti,” she said, referring to the State Welfare Organization.
She said buyers could choose the sex of a baby under 10 days old, claimed the infants were healthy and their parents had no history of addiction, and said buyers could bring their own doctor to examine the child.
She claimed the birth certificate, national ID, and medical records could be arranged to list the buyers as the baby's parents, adding that the process was confidential and would leave no trace of the purchaser. Radio Farda could not independently verify those claims.
The process starts with buyers submitting their identity documents and opening a file, which costs 200 million rials (about $75).
In a separate exchange, the channel admin said a baby boy was ready for handover and, after discussing terms, asked for 3 billion rials. She called the sum a "gift" that would cover legal steps, hospital bills, and support for the birth family.
Her account of where the babies come from shifted during the conversation, from newborns abandoned in hospitals to the children of families too poor to raise them.
A Birth Registered To Another Woman
A maternity ward nurse who says she brokered a baby's transfer to an Iranian family in the United States in 2021 described how such a deal can work.
According to the nurse, the birth mother, who already had four children, wanted to end her fifth pregnancy in its first trimester because of poverty. But a prospective family instead paid for her doctor's visits and ultrasounds and part of her living costs. She agreed to hand over the child for 700 million rials, worth roughly $2,560 in 2021.
The ultrasound and test records were registered under the adoptive mother's name, and the baby girl was discharged from hospital under that name, according to the nurse. The two women never met, she said, and the baby was taken to the United States about a month after birth. Radio Farda could not independently confirm these details.
The nurse said some families use makeup, maternity clothes, and staged photos to make it look as though the adoptive mother carried the pregnancy herself. Iranian law allows Iranians abroad to apply for guardianship through the Islamic republic's diplomatic missions, she noted, but some families avoid that route.
Another Telegram channel advertised a 3-day-old girl and a 7-day-old boy. Prospective buyers were told to call a woman the channel refers to as "Miss Doctor."
When contacted by Radio Farda, she said she welcomed placements with Iranians abroad, but someone inside Iran must handle the paperwork and follow-up. She said she also asks for identity documents and upfront payments, and suggests timing a birth to coincide with a buyer's visit to Iran.
Twins were also available, she said, adding that the babies came from unwanted pregnancies in families without the means to raise them. She said she meets couples two or three times in person to check that they are suitable.
Opening a file costs 100 million rials (about $37) with an extra 300 million rials (about $110) for twins, she said.
A Long-Standing Problem
A nurse at a state hospital's maternity ward told Radio Farda that her hospital transfers at least two newborns a month to Behzisti, mostly because their mothers are addicted to drugs or their families cannot care for them. Some babies are simply abandoned in hospitals, she added.
Iranian authorities have long acknowledged the problem of baby sales.
In January 2022, a senior Behzisti official said baby sales were on the rise and were sometimes arranged before birth. The following month, the head of Tehran's cyberpolice announced the arrest of a group that had offered babies online for 1.2 billion rials (around $4,750 at the time).
More than four years later, similar offers are still circulating on Telegram.
