Connecticut’s leading fertility center, CT Fertility, run by Dr. Michael Doyle, has announced the launch of a new “Donate and Preserve” program. The program offers repeat egg donors the option to save some of their eggs for their own use later on, should they have problems conceiving.

Recognizing the highly educated egg donors in their program, many on career paths that call for delayed motherhood, CT Fertility will now store the frozen eggs of the donor at no charge.

Of course, CT Fertility sees this as insurance for someone who very well may become another paying customer down the line, if she returns for IVF treatments using her own eggs. Or if the donor happens to get pregnant naturally down the road, her eggs can then be “donated” to CT Fertility for an “additional stipend.”

Doyle sees this as win-win. CT Fertility boasts one of the world’s largest donor egg banks “from which eggs can be offered ‘off-the-shelf’ at any quantity and at any time.”

CT Fertility also has a large gay parenting program. Some of their gay clients are using the freezing option to “help their donor preserve her fertility.”

As part of their cafeteria menu of choices for patients, CT Fertility also offers a “Freeze and Hold” option. This is for couples who are using their own eggs, but have moral issues with freezing embryos. This plan allows them to fertilize only the eggs they will use in a single cycle, and freeze the remaining eggs for later use.

This is what Eggsploitation looks like. Aggressively stimulating young women (how else will you have eggs to use now and eggs to freeze for later use?), potentially risking their health and future fertility, and dressing it all up as a benevolent win-win. Adult desires trump again.

Author Profile

Jennifer Lahl, CBC Founder
Jennifer Lahl, CBC Founder
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.