I’ve read the stories about the kids walking around the streets with T-shirts pronouncing, “My dad is donor #7. Who’s your dad?”. This article in the Daily Mail tells JoEllen’s story. She has two moms, a sperm donor dad, a half-sister from another sperm donor and 10 half-brothers and sisters, “she recently discovered”. One wonders how many other half siblings she may have out there.
Of course this new way of family building raises all kinds of social and ethical questions. One organization, Donor Sibling Registry, “seeks to assist individuals conceived as a result of sperm, egg or embryo donation who are seeking to make mutually desired contact with others with whom they share genetic ties.”
Oh the genetic ties that bind us!
Author Profile
- Jennifer Lahl, MA, BSN, RN, is founder and president of The Center for Bioethics and Culture Network. Lahl couples her 25 years of experience as a pediatric critical care nurse, a hospital administrator, and a senior-level nursing manager with a deep passion to speak for those who have no voice. Lahl’s writings have appeared in various publications including Cambridge University Press, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Dallas Morning News, and the American Journal of Bioethics. As a field expert, she is routinely interviewed on radio and television including ABC, CBS, PBS, and NPR. She is also called upon to speak alongside lawmakers and members of the scientific community, even being invited to speak to members of the European Parliament in Brussels to address issues of egg trafficking; she has three times addressed the United Nations during the Commission on the Status of Women on egg and womb trafficking.
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