Vandenbroucke urges the European Commission to introduce a European limit for sperm donors

“At least ten children have already developed cancers such as leukemia or non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Some children died as a result of the gene mutation,” Vandenbroucke says in his letter. “For other children, the gene mutation means lifelong medical checks and cancer screening.”

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The minister has been advocating for an – anonymous – European register for donors of sperm or eggs for some time. Governments can check how often and where a donor has been used and should help keep the number of offspring from the same donors in check, he explains in the letter.

But Vandenbroucke also wants a European limit on the number of children per donor, or the number of families that can use the same donor. In Belgium, this limit is six families, but in practice it could not be met in the case of the Danish donor because some sperm banks “even when they have contractually committed themselves to respecting the Belgian limits, do not organize themselves in such a way that they can also comply with that legislation,” he says. “We have seen cases where sperm banks supply material from the same donor to multiple clinics, making it virtually impossible to meet the Belgian quota.”