Dutch man with more than 550 children is prohibited from donating sperm – 02/05/2023 – Equilíbrio

A Dutchman suspected of fathering more than 550 children worldwide through sperm donations has been forced by Justice to stop.

The man named Jonathan, 41, could be fined more than €100,000 if he tries to donate semen again.

He was banned from donating to fertility clinics in the Netherlands in 2017 after news broke that he had fathered more than 100 children.

But instead of stopping, he continued donating sperm abroad and online.

A court in The Hague has ordered him to provide a list of all the clinics he has donated to and ordered them to destroy his sperm.

The man is believed to have deceived hundreds of women.

Dutch clinic guidelines state that a donor must not father more than 25 children in 12 families.

But judges said the man had helped father between 550 and 600 children since he started donating sperm in 2007.

He was sued by a foundation that protects children’s rights and also by the mother of one of the children allegedly conceived from his sperm.

“The point is that this kinship network of hundreds of half-brothers and half-sisters is very large,” said a court spokeswoman, Gert-Mark Smelt.

More than 100 of this man’s children were born in Dutch and other private clinics, but he also donated to a Danish clinic that shipped his semen to addresses in several countries.

Judge Thera Hesselink said the court “prohibits the defendant from donating his semen to new prospective parents after issuing this judgment”.

The man is also not allowed to contact prospective fathers “with a desire to donate semen. He is also barred from advertising his services to prospective fathers or joining any organization that establishes contact between prospective fathers,” the judge said.

The donor “wrongly and deliberately” informed future parents about the number of children he had in the past, the district court in The Hague said.

“All these parents are now confronted with the fact that the children in their family are part of a huge kinship network, with hundreds of half-siblings, that they didn’t choose to have,” he said.

The court said it was “sufficiently plausible” that this had or could have negative psychosocial consequences for the children.

Sperm donors are instructed to limit the number of times they offer their services, to reduce the chance of siblings unknowingly forming a couple and having children together.

The Netherlands has been hit by fertility scandals in the past.

In 2019, a Dutch fertility doctor was accused of using his own sperm to inseminate patients without their consent. He was confirmed as the father of 49 children.

This text was published here