Sperm donation policies in Europe called into question after cancer gene scandal

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Sperm donation policies in Europe called into question after cancer gene scandal  A Danish donor, unknowingly carrying a mutation in a gene that increases the risk of cancer, is said to have helped conceive at least 67 children, 10 of whom now have cancer.   READ MORE : http://www.euronews.com/2025/06/09/sperm-donation-policies-in-europe-called-into-question-after-cancer-gene-scandal  Subscribe to our channel. Euronews is available on Dailymotion in 12 languages

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00:00The disparity of sperm donor laws across Europe were pulled into question after a

00:06Danish donor with an inherited cancer mutation is said to have helped

00:10conceive dozens of children across the continent, mostly in Belgium. Out of the

00:1667 children, 23 of them are carriers of the gene variant, 10 of whom have

00:21developed cancer. The case has highlighted the shortcomings of sperm

00:26donation rules and regulations across Europe. On va avoir une dissémination

00:31finalement anormale d'une pathologie génétique puisque la banque de sperme

00:37qui est concernée dans ce cas a fixé une limite de 75 familles issues du

00:42donneur. Il y a d'autres banques de sperme qui n'ont pas fixé de limite, mais il n'y

00:45a pas de limite au niveau international et au niveau européen.

00:56In other countries, such as Austria, people conceived through sperm donations

01:00have the right to access donor information. In Germany and Bulgaria,

01:04donations may or may not be anonymous depending on the circumstances,

01:08and in the Netherlands, it is not anonymous at all. Rules regarding the maximum number

01:13of children conceived from a single donor also varies. It ranges from 15 in Germany to one in

01:19Cyprus. Other countries prefer to limit the number of families that can use the same donor to give them

01:25the opportunity to have siblings. For example, the same donor can help 12 families in Denmark

01:31and six families in Sweden or Belgium. The Danish, Swedish, Finnish and Norwegian National

01:37Councils for Medical Ethics have raised concerns over the lack of regulation, claiming it increases

01:42the risk of genetic diseases spreading. They also argue that in today's age, with social media

01:49and advanced DNA testing, donor anonymity can no longer be 100% guaranteed.

01:55That has to do with the risk that a genetic disease, perhaps, you know, in this case,

02:01unknowingly, comes to be spread much more widely than it would have been if a number had been

02:07lower. So that's one reason. A second reason is, now that we have all these genetic testing

02:12technologies, and half-siblings can find each other through the internet, and then finally,

02:17as I mentioned, the inadvertent meeting of, you know, a half-sibling without knowing that they're,

02:22your half-sibling, of course, continues to be a concern for some.

02:25The four national ethics councils are now calling for restrictions to be introduced

02:29at a European level, and for registers to be set up.

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