Two little girls in their bath who put foam everywhere. Another jumps on her parents' bed. A toddler who ravages the family kitchen, and puts his cuddly toy in the pan. All this under the gaze of their visibly exhausted parents... "Donate your gametes, you will make people happy" proclaim the posters of the new campaign of the Biomedicine Agency to encourage gamete donation, in order to cope with the influx of requests for medically assisted procreation (ART).
It is through humour that the campaign #Faitesdesparents intends to reach "the two audiences most inclined to give": young people aged 18 to 24 and those under 44 who have just had a child, explains the Biomedicine Agency. Assisted reproduction centres received 26,600 requests for first consultations from couples or women with a view to ART between 2021 and the end of March 2023, compared to "only" 2000 requests in 2019... This dizzying increase is linked to the bioethics law of August 2, 2021, which opened up medically assisted procreation to female couples and single women. A law that "responded to a real need in society, there was an explosion in demand," commented Marine Jeantet, director general of the Biomedicine Agency, at a press conference. At this point, we don't know if this is a catch-up effect or if demand will remain at this level.By the endof March 2023, nearly 6,200 people were waiting for ART with sperm donation, including 41% female couples, 40% single women and 19% heterosexual couples.
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Access to origins
The stock of 89,000 sperm straws available at the end of March 2023 will not be enough, as a large part will soon have to be destroyed: from the end of March 2025, only those from donors who have consented to access to their data will be able to be used. The stock of usable straws, "estimated at 26,000sperm straws at the end of March 2023, must increase rapidly in order to be able to cope with the growing demands for ART care", says the Biomedicine Agency.
The campaign, which kicked off on Wednesday and will run until the end of the year, will be particularly visible in cities with a gamete donation centre. Videos will be shown on social media, catch-up TV services and in cinemas. Posters will also be distributed in the press, doctors' surgeries and universities. Last year, 990 women and 764 men applied for egg or sperm donation. Any healthy person between the ages of 18 and 37 for women, and up to the age of 44 for men, can donate gametes, the Biomedicine Agency reminds us. He insists: "Donating gametes is not the same as making a child. It's about making parents."