Genea Partners with The World Egg Bank to Provide Donor Eggs
This article was originally published on The Sydney Morning Herald on August 15, 2014, written by Kim Arlington.
Patients undergoing IVF in NSW will be able to import donor eggs from the US under a partnership between fertility clinic Genea and the World Egg Bank.
The US-based bank is the largest commercial frozen egg donor bank in the world, recruiting and screening donors aged between 18 and 29. Profiles on the bank’s website—many featuring photographs—provide donors’ details including age, height, weight, ethnicity, education level, talents, and interests.
While the bank has partnered with IVF clinics in Victoria and Queensland, this is the first time patients undergoing treatment in NSW will have access to its donors. It charges about $19,000 to ship six mature, frozen eggs to Australia.
Genea’s medical director, Associate Professor Mark Bowman, said the arrangement provided another option for women and couples unable to conceive with their own eggs. Finding a local donor was the preferred option, he said, but the sale and purchase of donor eggs is banned in Australia, and people often struggled to find an altruistic donor among family, friends, or through advertising.
“For many of those women, their only other alternative up to now was to go overseas and have egg donation in a clinic in another country,” Professor Bowman said. “This is another pathway giving women in a very difficult situation wider options. Nowadays, egg freezing is much more successful than it used to be.”
Some local patients have already begun treatment with eggs from the bank. The US donors must comply with Australian and state laws on egg donation and assisted reproductive technology, receiving counseling and having their details registered so any children conceived can contact them in the future. Each donor’s eggs may be used for a maximum of five families.
The World Egg Bank does not pay donors but compensates them up to $US5000 ($5,400) for expenses such as childcare, lost wages, and travel.
