The end of donor anonymity – what does this mean?

Wednesday 27th July 2022 – 8pm (BST)

In this webinar we discuss the end of donor anonymity and what this means for donors, parents and individuals conceived through donor gametes. I am joined by three wonderful speakers who each bring a different lens to this topic. Professor Joyce Harper shares the findings of her research into this topic, Gerry McCluskey, an experienced fertility counsellor, talks about what this means for parents embarking on donor conception and Hayley Darknell shares her personal insights, both as a recipient parent and a donor conceived person.

We’ll explore the impact of commercial DNA testing and how this has meant that anonymity can no longer be guaranteed, whilst answering your questions about what this means in terms of potentially finding not only a donor, but also half siblings too.

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Speaker Bio

Hayley Darknell

Hayley lives in Wales with her wife of 11 years. They have two beautiful children via donor sperm IVF. Her wife carried and they used her eggs. In a twist of fate, Hayley is also a donor conceived person herself. Her parents used an anonymous (sperm) donor to have her as part of pioneering IVF treatment in the 1980s, however she didn’t find this out until much later in life.

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Speaker Bio

Gerry McCluskey

Working for Family Routes, a voluntary social work agency, Gerry McCluskey has a particular interest in the broad range of different ways in which families are formed, the issues of belonging, connection, identity, loss and fulfilment which relate to the pursuit of family life whatever its form.

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