Consequences?

A reader has kindly pointed me to 'Sydney women turn to US dads for sperm donation' by Rosie Squires in the [Sydney] Sunday Telegraph, highlighting consequences - intended or otherwise - of post-2009 restrictions on anonymity for sperm donors.

Squires claims that -

Sydney women are importing sperm from the US because Australian men are too scared to donate.

Local donations to IVF clinics have all but stopped since it became easier for children to track down their biological fathers.

IVF Australia head Professor Michael Chapman told The Sunday Telegraph that donor shortages had become critical, falling from 100 to 10 at his clinic in the past four years.

"Last year we only had two or three donors on our books," Professor Chapman said. "Today around Australia there are about 50 donors, but the demand is still substantially higher than that."

As a result, IVF Australia started importing sperm from the US two months ago.

Professor Chapman said donor imports were "not ideal" but would help reduce waiting times for insemination.

In January last year a law came into effect stating that all sperm donors must agree to provide identifying information so that the child would be able to contact them once they reached 18.

Fertility specialist Professor Peter Illingworth said the change in the law was directly linked to the drop-off in sperm donors.

"There is no doubt that when the law was first introduced, it affected the number of men willing to donate sperm. It is a big undertaking. Being a donor is very serious and the fact is, not many men are willing to do it," he said.

Illingworth's clinic has reportedly 'been careful in its choice of an offshore sperm bank' -

"We have for a long time been looking for a way to improve sperm donor numbers in Australia.

"We have now found an agency in the US whose donors have given consent to provide identity to the child after they turn 18," he said.

Professor Illingworth said sperm donors would also stick to strict NSW regulations stipulating that each donor could only supply four families with sperm.

Professor Chapman said Australian clinics needed more local donors because importing sperm was "not ideal".

"There is still that issue that, despite their undertakings, an overseas donor perhaps is less likely to be tracked in the future," he said.

The article claims that in the 12 months to September 2011 some 194 babies were born in NSW through sperm donations, consistent with figures in the Senate committee report highlighted last year.

In April 2010 the Telegraph claimed that -

A critical shortage of donor sperm has forced the state's largest IVF clinic to launch an online advertising campaign targeting male generosity.

Tougher restrictions on imported sperm has shrunk already scarce supplies while new legislation, which gives children the right to know the identity of their donor father, has seen a big decline in donor numbers.

Fertility experts said there were less than 10 registered sperm donors left in NSW, forcing many of the state's 24 IVF clinics to close the books on couples keen to conceive by donor insemination.

In NSW the Assisted Reproductive Technology Act 2007 (NSW) and the Assisted Reproductive Technology Regulation 2009, in effect from 1 January 2010, establish a central ART donor register.

The Register features information about gamete donors and children born as a result of ART treatment using donated gametes (sperm and ova), with individuals conceived using donated gametes (once they turn 18), their legal parents and donors being able to access certain information.

The Register contains -

• the donor’s full name
• the donor’s residential address
• the donor’s date and place of birth
• the donor’s ethnicity and physical characteristics
• any medical history or genetic test results of the donor or the donor's family that are relevant to the future health of -

• a person undergoing ART treatment involving the use of the donated gamete
• any offspring born as a result of that treatment
• any descendents of any such offspring

• the name of each ART provider that has previously obtained a donated gamete from the donor and the date on which the gamete was obtained
• the sex and year of birth of any offspring of the donor.

The Register also includes the following information about a child born as a result of ART treatment using donated gametes -

• the donor conceived child’s full name, sex and date of birth
• the name of the woman who gave birth to the child
• the full name and date and place of birth of the donor of the gamete.

Not all of that data is currently publicly available. Adults who were donor conceived after the legislation came into effect (ie who reach adulthood after 2017) will have mandatory access to -

• the donor's full name
• the donor's residential address
• the donor's date and place of birth
• the donor's ethnicity and physical characteristics
• any medical history or genetic test results (prior to donation) of the donor or the donor's family that are relevant to the future health of -

• a person undergoing ART treatment involving use of the donated gamete, or
• any offspring born as a result of that treatment, or
• any descendent of any such offspring

• the name of the ART provider that provided the above information, and
• the sex and year of birth of each other offspring of the donor.

There is no requirement on donors to keep their information current.

Some people of course were donor-conceived prior to the legislation. Mandatory access to the Register does not operate retrospectively. For donors whose donated sperm, eggs or embryos were used prior to 1 January 2010 access to some/all information will be dependent on them -

• voluntarily adding their details to the Register and
• consenting to having their information released.