Chioma, still still maintains that the baby Hope is her son.Chioma clings to her baby, Hope, close to her chest. For her, this is the miracle child after eight years of trying and failing to produce one. "I own my baby," she tells me defiantly.
Seated beside her husband Ike in an official's office in Anambra, Nigeria, she faces questions that assault everything she values. Five members of Ike's family are there, ranging from scepticism to hostility. They accuse Chioma and Ike of fraud in the claim that the baby is theirs.
The controversy? She claims that the baby was carried for 15 months, an impossible claim by science and unbelievable.
Pressure from Social Circle to Conceive
For instance, in Nigeria, where one of the highest birth rates in the world is recorded, infertility translates to stigma and ostracism. Loss of childbearing ability consequently leads to great amounts of social pressure for many women like Chioma.
Chioma narrates, her voice visibly quivering: "Ike's family judged me every day. They told him to marry another woman because I cannot give him a child." Thoroughly desperate for a solution, Chioma turned to a "miracle clinic," which promised her something traditional medicine could not: a baby of her own.
Unmasking the Scam
The so-called "clinic" was no ordinary medical facility. Women were administered injections, drinks, or powders with which, for hundreds of dollars, pregnancy was apparently guaranteed.
They told me not to go see any normal doctor, Chioma explains. They said my baby won't show up in scans because it's a 'special' pregnancy. Fraudsters used pseudoscience and deception to manipulate the women. The victims claimed their physical alterations, among them swollen stomachs and missed periods, which convinced them they were truly pregnant.
When it was time to "deliver," they would be given opioids or other substances that caused them to enter a state of hallucination. Some woke up with major Caesarean-like scars; others were handed newborns they thought were their biological children.
A Glimpse Inside the Clinics
Investigations into the miracle clinics uncovered some shocking practices.
Operating out of dilapidated locations, so-called "specialists" offered women injections and crushed pills, saying they could even choose the sex of their baby.
The first "treatment" costs hundreds of thousands of naira, while subsequent treatments ran into millions. When women came back, disputing the results, claiming they were not impregnated with the drugs, sometimes they were given artificial heartbeats to confirm the pregnancy.
Selling Babies for the Ruse
Newborns are used to sustain the false claims of success. During a raid, officers found one facility in which Chioma had just "given birth" to Hope.
The raid revealed an incredible operation: in one part was housed pregnant women tied up against their will, and another operated as a makeshift clinic. Some of these girls were as young as 17 years old, lured or coaxed into giving away their babies.
The raid also rescued a young mother, Uju, who confessed to being offered money for her child. "I was scared and didn't know what else to do," she said.
A Web of Deception
The scam feeds on misinformation. On Facebook, groups that obsess over "cryptic pregnancies" build straw houses of wild claims, often wrapped in religiosity.
One post put forth that a woman had been pregnant for decades, flouting the laws of medical science. Such groups are hotbeds of scams; often, the administrators serve as recruitment agents.
Women interested in these miracle treatments are added to private WhatsApp groups where scammers furnish step-by-step instructions.
A Victim or a Perpetrator?
In the commissioner's office, Chioma begs her case. She insists she had no knowledge the process was a scam.
Commissioner Ify Obinabo, who had led crackdowns on similar scams, finally agreed to let Chioma and Ike keep baby Hope unless the biological parents came forward.
The commissioner concludes that Chioma is a victim, too. But this cycle will continue unless we address the root causes."
Breaking the Cycle
The cryptic pregnancy scam is a very harsh reminder of all the vulnerabilities women face in societies where infertility is stigmatized.
Experts warn that, without a change in societal attitudes and increased enforcement of reproductive rights, such scams will continue.
For Chioma, Hope represents the child she had dreamed of for years. For the many women still caught in the web of this cruel scam, however, the hope they are promised remains an illusion.
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