'Sperm donor with cancer-causing gene fathered nearly 100 children'

A French researcher revealed last week at a medical conference in Milan that a donor whose sperm has been distributed throughout Europe via the Danish sperm bank European Sperm Bank since 2008 carries a rare gene mutation that can cause cancer.

Research has shown that a rare mutation occurs in the TP53 gene. It remains unclear what percentage of his sperm cells passes the gene on to the children conceived from it, but it is thought to be less than half.

This unfortunate discovery was made when, in two families, a donor-conceived child developed cancer. In Europe, ten children are now believed to have become ill, including cases of leukaemia and non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The donor himself is not thought to have become ill. The gene mutation that the donor carries causes Li-Fraumeni syndrome, a rare but dominant hereditary disorder that significantly increases susceptibility to a wide range of cancers.

The sperm in question has been sent to fertility clinics in eleven European countries since 2008.

(SR - Source: Het Nieuwsblad - Illustrative photo: ©Image by StockSnap from Pixabay)