Government against legalization of egg donation

    

    

Doctors newspaper online, 23.08.2019

    

        
        
        

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Bundestag

BERLIN. An amendment to the Embryo Protection Act is no longer planned in this legislature. This has been explained by the Federal Government to a parliamentary request of the FDP in the Bundestag.

Thus, a legalization of egg donation, which was the starting point of the FDP request, not tackled. In support of this, the government refers to the fundamental decision made in the Embryo Protection Act in 1991.

"In the interests of the best interests of the child, the ban aims to ensure the uniqueness of motherhood." She refers to the thesis, proclaimed for almost 30 years, that a "split motherhood" would complicate the child's "self-discovery."

Leopoldina contradicts

The National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina has objected to this assumption in a statement published in March of this year : "Contrary to the earlier expressed fears, children who are produced by egg donation, after birth to other children conceived by IVF no medical or psychosocial abnormalities, "it says.

Egg and sperm donation can not be compared, the government emphasizes the objection that both facts are treated unequally. The making available of eggs – unlike the sperm donation – is a "complicated process with considerable depth of involvement".

Here, too, the Leopoldina comes to another assessment: the egg cell production is now "performed much gentler, so that the health risks for the donors are low," the scientists.

Government does not know exact numbers

When asked how many couples from Germany annually make an egg donation in other EU countries, the government can contribute nothing – you have no knowledge.

The Leopoldina cites estimates according to which women from Germany went abroad "at several thousand treatment cycles" each year.

The number of women receiving egg donation in Europe is estimated at more than 56,000 in 2014 in research. Except in Germany, this procedure is prohibited only in Switzerland, Norway and Luxembourg. (FST)

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