The Scottish Government has defended a £186,000 advertising push urging young women to donate their eggs after campaigners warned that they were underplaying the risks.
Surrogacy Concern told The Herald it was “an extraordinary step for the state to take” and that they did not know “of any other Government in the world which is targeting its own people for their gametes."
But with more than 200 people waiting for a donor in Scotland, the government said a marketing drive was necessary to hike the number of altruistic donations.
READ MORE: More than third of patients wait too long in A&E despite improvement
The Scottish Government first launched a campaign to encourage people to become sperm and egg donors in 2021, with two more phases in 2022 and then again last October, during National Fertility Week, when adverts ran across radio and the internet.
In their initial campaign they cited research which suggested that almost half of people in Scotland would consider donating gametes to those who need help to conceive.
To be eligible to donate eggs, the donor needs to be aged between 18 and 35 and be able to commit to the programme for about three months.
The digital campaign featured animated visuals of an egg and sperm joining together to spell out optimistic words such as Joy, Love and Hope.
Key messages included telling potential donors that they "could give the joy of starting a family to those who need help becoming parents" and that "NHS Scotland needs egg and sperm donors for those who need your help to create a loving family".
Helen Gibson, who founded Surrogacy Concern and obtained the cost of the Scottish Government campaign through Freedom of Information said none of the adverts detailed the health risks associated with egg donation.
She said: "We were appalled to learn the Scottish Government were targeting young women in this way; a woman's gametes are not public resources, to be harvested and shared out amongst the wider population.”
Ms Gibson added: “Many will consider this an appalling way to use taxpayers money. We do not know of any other Government in the world which is targeting its own people for their gametes.
"Women in the UK have died from complications arising from egg retrieval. Younger women are at increased risk for ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome, a condition caused by egg harvesting, for which there is no cure.
“Nowhere on these adverts did health risks feature. Women's bodies are not resources to be mined. Targeting people as young as 18 for eggs and sperm is concerning in the extreme and we urge the Government not to repeat this campaign.
“The infertility of others is not young women's problem to solve.”
READ MORE: 'Keep drink in hand:' Leitch's advice to Yousaf on dodging pandemic mask rules
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “There is a shortage of egg and sperm donors across the UK and the Scottish Government, in partnership with NHS Scotland, launched the recent national donor gamete campaigns to help alleviate this shortage.
“All donations are altruistic and are made through a desire to help those people in Scotland who need help becoming parents.
“All potential donors within NHS Scotland receive mandatory counselling, and the four NHS Assisted Conception Units give prospective donors accessible and up-to-date information to enable them to make informed decisions about any consent they then provide.
“This is a thorough process and it takes months to reach the point of donation.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel