More and more donor children want to know their donor father
Many children want to know where they come from. Photo AFP, Henning Bagger
Western Europe
In the Netherlands, more and more donor-conceived people want to know their biological father. Or who was the sperm donor that is the father of their child.
That is reported by the Dutch press agency ANP and the Christian daily Reformatorisch Dagblad.
The organisation that deals with this phenomenon, Foundation donor data artificial fertilisation (Sdkb), received 1415 requests for information last year. That’s the highest number in the last ten years. Compared to 2020, the number of applications increased by 30 per cent.
Desire for information
Also, there was a sharp rise in requests about treatments before 2004, when the legislation was different. Or people were curious to know “physical and social data” about the donor. And legal parents asked more times for information about the sperm donor who fulfilled their desire to have children.
The foundation says the number of requests for information has been rising for a decade already, “but the growth this year is greater than before”.
In March and December, there were an impressive number of applications. That could have to do with media attention, for example, a documentary series about Dr Jan Karbaat, who made dozens of women pregnant with his own sperm. After that documentary, it became clear that Karbaat was not the only fertility doctor who did that. Only in Holland, there are at least four cases of this.
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