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There are always plenty of media stories about the shortage of sperm donors in the UK, long waiting lists if you need to use donor sperm and the ‘falling’ numbers of sperm donors since anonymity was removed. However, HFEA figures have shown that the removal of anonymity hasn’t actually reduced the number of donors coming forward, and here at Manchester Fertility Services – unlike other sperm banks – we don’t have any waiting lists for donor sperm...

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New research has shown that many couples are having to seek fertility treatment abroad because of a lack of sperm and egg donors in the UK. The new study, published in the journal Human Reproduction, revealed the major reasons for seeking fertility treatment abroad were a lack of donors in the UK, long waiting times for NHS treatment, high costs and a ‘postcode lottery’ for NHS IVF...

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It often takes a personal story to make more people think about donating sperm or eggs, and recently a Stockport woman made hers public in an effort to raise awareness of the lack of egg donors. 37-year-old Sarah Johnson suffers from a rare medical condition, Turner Mosaic Syndrome, which meant she went through the menopause at just 12 years of age...

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A soldier left unable to have children after being injured in Afghanistan has launched a campaign to urge fellow comrades to preserve their sperm before frontline deployment.

Sergeant Rick Clements says soldiers should be given free treatment to freeze sperm and warned about the risks they face where their fertility is concerned. Currently, the MoD provides fertility preservation information to soldiers on request...

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There was a wonderful article in the Guardian newspaper recently about sperm donation. The newspaper has a regular column called ‘A Letter To…’ where people can write a heartfelt message to someone and say all the things they’ve always wanted to...

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All of our egg and sperm donors at Manchester Fertility Services are given mandatory counselling by our team.

You may be wondering why this would be needed? The decision to become a sperm or egg donor isn’t one that should be taken lightly.

Since the removal of donor anonymity, any child born as a result of your donation has the right to apply for identifiable information about you when they turn 18. This means they may wish to get in touch with you...

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I’ve recently seen a patient who was considering donor sperm insemination. Before coming to us, they had been to see an alternative infertility clinic which imports all their donor sperm from the European Sperm Bank. And who foots the bill for shipping it over? You do, the patient...

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It’s great news that the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) has recognised the need for donor-conceived people to find out more about their genetic ‘siblings’. The new Donor Sibling Link (DSL), created by the HFEA, allows those conceived after 1 August 1991, or who are over 18, to find other people who may share the same donor as them. People who have consented to be on the register will be able to share their contact details with others, allowing genetically-linked ‘siblings’ to get in touch...

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The answer to the UK’s lack of sperm donors could be down to something as simple as having the right information at your fingertips. Since we revamped our main Manchester Fertility Services and Manchester Donors websites, we have seen a five-fold increase in the number of men applying to be donors to our clinic. And the good news is that most of these applicants stand a very good chance of being accepted...

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There’s nothing like a movie blockbuster to get everyone talking and in the case of Jennifer Aniston’s forthcoming film, Hollywood is finally acknowledging sperm donation and bringing the donate message to the masses. In ‘The Switch’, Jennifer plays a single woman who uses donor sperm to get pregnant. There’s no doubt from what I’ve read that it will be sugar-coated, rose-tinted view of what it’s like to use donor sperm insemination to have a child...

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