Almost 30,000 people in the UK have no legal right to know who their parents are. My child is one of them. I am to blame because it is clearly wrong. I decided to have a baby on my own. I didn't have a partner, but two men offered to be the donors. The first test-tube twins were produced by Prof Ian Craft. I have been unable to locate the research he advised that it was less emotionally complicated for a child to have an anonymous donor.
I did that. I gave birth to a baby girl at 45 years old. anonymous donors were guaranteed anonymity for the rest of their lives. I gave up my child's right to know who her father was because of that decision. The arrangement has an ethical flaw. I don't know how I could have given up someone else.
My daughter is a legal exception. She is one of 29,725 people who were born by egg or sperm donation between August 1991 and April 2005. Donor parents were guaranteed anonymity during this brief period. Children were given the right to know the identity of their donors after 2005, after no official central record was kept of donors.
The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Agency is considering whether to recommend that children conceived through donation should have the right to know their parents' identities from birth. I think this is a good time for the agency to consider whether the anonymity of past donors should be reconsidered.
My daughter has not yet found out who her father is, and as things stand, she may never know. Her sense of identity is affected by this. I told her the truth about how I conceived her and she was happy because she didn't have a father. All I could tell her was the information I was allowed to give: his height, build, colour and profession.
She is allowed to know the number of her half-siblings. The opportunity to state if they would like to be contacted is offered by the HFEA. Very few do. Only 27 people have received information from the HFEA about their donors, and only 223 donors from 1991 to 2005 have said they were willing to be contacted by their children. Many people don't know they were born by donation, or they don't want to find out about their parents. My child wants to know, but no relatives have been found.
Half of the family medical history is blank. This has significant implications because of the growing understanding of the importance of heredity. The end of donor anonymity in Australia was made retroactive after a woman who was born with a donation was diagnosed with cancer. She wanted to make sure that her half-siblings were aware of the risk to their health. She died after her fight.
There is a precedent for the British state to back away from a promise of lifetime anonymity for biological parents. The right to obtain the original copy of their birth certificate was granted to adopted adults in the mid-1970s.
The HFEA's chief executive, Peter Thompson, says that society needs to start a conversation about donor anonymity because of the widespread use of cheap DNA tests. The truth is that people will just find out, so donors should consider ending their anonymity so that they can do so with support from the HFEA. The same goes for children who don't know where they come from. With all parties aware and informed, and with parental support and counselling/support services on hand where needed, it is better that this information is revealed by the Donor Conception Network.
Donor anonymity should be abolished retroactively according to my daughter. I don't think it's right to stop someone from knowing who they are.
The former head of news and current affairs at Channel 4 is a woman.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
