Who Owns a Donor’s Sperm?

An interesting Israeli case involving a woman who resides in Florida has brought the question of donated sperm ownership to light. A woman who purchased sperm to have her first child, later bought 5 additional samples from the same donor through a sperm bank. She decided to have the samples frozen so that when she did decided to have more children, her daughter would have biological siblings. Apparently, the sperm donor changed his lifestyle over a course of time and decided that he no longer wanted his sperm available to buyers. The donor expressed his concerns to the Health Ministry of Israel and the woman was told over the phone that she would receive compensation for storage fees incurred but the sperm would no longer be available to her.

The woman launched a legal battle which ended recently with a High Court of Justice rejecting her request to have the sperm she had paid for. The court found that the donor’s right to change his mind after making the donation takes precedence over the recipient’s right to use the sperm in order to give birth to biological siblings for her daughter.

Justices Elyakim Rubinstein, Daphne Barak-Erez and Isaac Amit cited their “sympathy” for Galit and her situation, but stated: “We have reached the conclusion that priority must accrue to the donor and his personal autonomy.” They added, “One can understand the viewpoint of a person who, after thinking it over, reached the conclusion – which he had not entertained when he decided, for various reasons, to donate sperm – that he does not want children to be born from his sperm, because he did not choose them or their mother, has no ties with them and will not raise them.”

The full article can be found here.