You might be a little confused by that headline, because what exactly is a gender-screening ad?

Consider this then – India suffers from one of the world’s worst gender imbalances, a problem heightened by the multitude of companies that offer services to determine a baby’s sex before birth.

Now powerhouse companies Google, Microsoft and Yahoo have all pledged to block such adverts from their sites and search engines, with some reasoning below from Bloomberg:

Some parents prefer sons because they’re considered more reliable bread-winners and better able to carry on the family name. Male children are known to get better nutrition and education and a 2015 United Nations report said India had one of the world’s most skewed sex ratios in the under-five age group. The UN added that 100 girls die by the age of five, compared with 93 boys.

That’s not ideal, but the most horrifying reason for the ban is one that takes place under the veil of secrecy:

Female foeticide and infanticide are serious issues in India, where there were 943 females per 1,000 males according to the last nationwide census in 2011. Conducting, selling and advertising foetal sex-selection services was made a punishable offence in 1994, thus outlawing sex-determination and abortions. Yet thousands of female foetuses are aborted secretly every year in clinics across local communities with a strong preference for sons.

The companies hope that the ban on the ads will deter such female foetus abortions. There will also be a warning displayed, telling users that pre-natal screening is illegal in India, when certain searches are performed.

[source:bloomberg]