tto think it should be illegal to travel abroad for anonymous egg/sperm donation?

[ZoeCM]

If the government can ban people from travelling outside the UK for FGM, why can't they ban this? It's absolutely appalling that clinics will destroy all records of a child's biological parent in this day and age. Yes, the child can potentially trace their parents through companies such as AncestryDNA, but there's no guarantee they'll be successful. It's a massive abuse of power.

Anonymous donation is all about what's best for the recipients and the donor, never the child. AIBU to think it should be illegal to travel abroad for this purpose?

I think @mucky123, parents who have chosen, or intend to chose anonymous gamete donation will downplay how you were affected by it and focus on you finding out late and the information being withheld. They won’t hear that there is harm in being cut of from your genetic heritage in and of itself. They are too invested.

The thing is, I know quite a number of couples who haven’t been able to conceive, single women too. I do not know anyone who used donor gametes (who wasn’t part of a same sex couple). Everyone I know accepted that infertility, some after failed infertility treatment. It’s obvious to me that the science and the fertility business is changing expectations, and not in a good way for children’s rights.

The laws in this country were decided after consultation with interested parties & the general public

Yes, and what was found is that anonymous donation has poorer outcomes for children than known donation. That is why we have the laws we do.

Some will be fine with it, some really really won’t.

My donor conceived child is very interested in his genetic heritage and considers it a vital part of who he is.

I couldn’t know before I had him how he would react, so I made sure he had the best opportunity possible for either eventuality.

This.

The very sad stories of people traumatised by being adopted, donor conceived or not the biological child of their parent by any other means, are often because they found out the wrong way as a teen or adult.

The other point that people are missing is that, in this country, there is no requirement to tell a child they are donor conceived. So unfortunately there will still be children who find out in the wrong way.

The advice given these days is to tell children ‘their story’ from when they are very young. And re-visiting as they grow, so they alway ‘know’ it was an amazing act of generosity by the donor, not something shameful & hidden.

@crumblingschools I can see where you are coming from, but apply that to the rest of the population. There are children born in poverty or to addicts or neglectful parents - should we be forcibly sterilising the whole population and having a vetting procedure to decide which situations are in the best interests of the child? You’re only allowed to reproduce if you’re in a stable relationship, with a good income, a house with a garden and a stay-at-home parent?

Who are you to decide that someone is better off never having been born? Just because their mother had chemotherapy as a child and therefore needed donor eggs to conceive.

It shows what egg donation is like in a country where it is regulated and ethical considerations are borne in mind. Now imagine what it is like in a country where it is unregulated, big business where ethics don’t matter, where impoverished young women are targetted to sell their eggs via a procedure which is painful, invasive and not risk free. The trouble is people stick their fingers in their ears and go la la la I’m not listening because I want a baby.

And before anyone says anything I have experienced infertility. I just didn’t think I was entitled to a baby at any cost. And I’m know I’m not the only one on here who has been through infertility but doesn’t agree with gamete donation.

I find the “do something amazing” rhetoric around egg donation frankly disturbing. We aren’t talking about saving lives here.

@KimberleyClark, on a thread like this, it will likely be skewed towards people who believe in obtaining a child by whatever means possible.

I imagine the majority of people outside this thread though, would see the ethical issues as paramount, otherwise donors would be allowed to retain anonymity in this country.

A really sobering article. I know it is old but things are unlikely to have changed much in these unregulated countries.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2006/apr/30/health.healthandwellbeing

I don’t know if anyone remembers a few decades ago, when couples would adopt ‘Chinese orphans’, and it turned out the children were kidnapped. The desire to obtain a child will be met by people with no scruples if strong ethical limits are not set.

I hope your second para is right. I just can’t imagine buying a woman’s eggs knowing absolutely nothing of her circumstances and reasons for donating.

I think women’s rights are a harder sell aren’t they? Harder than children’s rights. Egg donation and surrogacy are couched in ‘beautiful gift’ language which obscures the exploitation.

Very sobering and depressing.

I remember the Dying Rooms documentary and the scandal that followed and I know lots of people wanted to adopt those little girls. Was it connected to that?

I believe so, I think demand for the children started to outstrip supply.

Sad that people wanting to do some good i.e. rescue baby girls who would otherwise die can end up causing something evil. I remember the horror and outrage when that documentary was shown, it was truly horrific. Those poor babies.

Donors in the UK were told it would be anonymous, but then the law changed. Same could happen in other countries I guess, although no guarantees

It’s really not the black or white situation you seem to imagine. Many of us who don’t agree with your stance or particular lens through which you are viewing things, are not saying that people should be able to ‘obtain a child through any means possible’.

You are missing the shades of grey and nuance. Fine not to agree with posters and have a different view. Not fine to characterise anyone who disagrees with you as occupying a position at one extreme end of the spectrum when they haven’t said that’s the case.

I can’t see what you are objecting to here.

There are people on this thread who are saying that the rules and regulations of the fertility industry means it is not possible for them to find or afford donor gametes in the UK, so they are going abroad where the fertility industry is not limited by such ethical constraints, where treatment is also cheaper and gametes more abundant as a result.

They are pushing things as far as the law, the science and the fertility business will allow them on their budget. They are determined to obtain child by whatever means possible. Many seem to believe this determination to try everything possible, means they are almost worthier parents, who ‘want’ the child more than parents who don’t go through this, and that this is all that’s needed to salve the child’s potential discomfort about their own origins.

Well, I will say that you’re consistent in your use of hyperbole and stretching analogies to the extreme to the point of being irrelevant, while making up scenarios.

Going to other European countries where fertility treatment is a lot cheaper and using donor eggs or sperm is NOT synonymous with being using ‘any means possible’ to get a child. You make it sound like they’re snatching babies out of their parents’ arms, not utilising a healthcare system in a developed nation whose laws happen to be slightly different to those that pertain to the UK.

I have no idea whatsoever where you’re got the idea that people using donors think they’re ‘worthier’ parents. That’s a projection entirely of your own.

People will object to “whatever means possible” because it’s hyperbolic. No one here wants a child by “any means possible.”

Would I use donated eggs if necessary? Possibly. Would I abduct a baby from a maternity ward? No. Everyone has limits, no one operates on “any way possible.” It’s just people have different limits.

For example, some people would only adopt via open adoption because they feel it’s more ethical for the adoptee to keep some level of birth family contact. Others feel a closed adoption is better and avoids any confusion. Both those people have limits and things they wouldn’t do and both positions are valid.

Making people who don’t agree with you regarding the ethical nature of a type of fertility treatment sound desperate to the point of unethical is a bit unkind.

@adviceneeded1990 but we know that open adoption and knowing their genetic history are both better for children.
If you went to an adoption agency and said "I'm never going to let my child have any information about their birth family and I refuse to have any contact with them. If my child wants to meet them I will tell them no" you would not be allowed to adopt.

I think all egg and sperm donation should be banned.

And that is exactly what people who are using anonymous donation are doing @drspouse I assume they wouldn’t approve of adoptive parents doing that though

In the UK. And for what it’s worth I 100% agree with that! I also agree that where possible children should know their genetic origins. There is no way to police that or make it illegal though - you can ban the use of donor gametes from abroad but how are you going to prove it? How are you going to stop an ovulating woman from having a random one night stand with the intention of depriving a child of knowing their father? You can’t.

I know that there are better options available to some people. I just don’t think being conceived by a loving family using donated gametes is the worst possible thing in the world, which others seem to based on the hyperbolic language such as “evil” scattered throughout this thread.
That’s my opinion and if I get pregnant this way and my child hates me for it then it’ll be my problem. Just like if I was to conceive at 15, or with no money, or in an abusive relationship, or by a one stand night, or with a life limiting illness, or many, many other scenarios in which a child may resent you for conceiving in a way which leaves them with questions or a damaged childhood.

You want to to tell me what I can and cannot do with my eggs? Yeah alright.

*you can ban the use of donor gametes from abroad but how are you going to prove it?"
DNA, paper trail, witnesses... Same way you'd prosecute a couple who said the child they were bringing in from abroad was their biological child when actually it was a cousin they'd forged a birth certificate for.