Teenager With Genetic Disease Given Go Ahead To Sue Sperm Bank
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Brittany Donovan is 13 years old and was born with fragile X syndrome, FXS. FXS is a genetic disorder causing mental impairment – Brittany has severe learning difficulties.
Brittany was conceived using sperm from a New York sperm bank, Idant Laboratories, and testing showed that her FXS was inherited from her biological father. A US judge gave Brittany clearance to sue Idant Laboratories under product liability laws.
First, Brittany’s mother tried to sue in 2008, but couldn’t because of the statute of limitations in product liability cases is only two years. But the rules are different for minor children and Brittany is able to sue the sperm bank.
Brittany and her lawyers don’t have to show that Idant was negligent. They have to show that the sperm Idant provided was unsafe and caused injury.
Do you think the sperm bank is responsible for Brittany’s condition? Genetic testing was in its infancy in 1996 when the sperm was donated and while it was possible to test for FXS, it would have been prohibitively expensive to do routinely.
And picking a mate and having a baby the old-fashioned way is certainly no guarantee against genetic disorders.
If Brittany wins her case, it will likely open the way for thousands of other cases brought by babies and children with sperm donor families. Sperm donors are currently not in short supply in the USA, but this lawsuit together with likely future changes that will reduce or remove anonymity of donors, there may well be a shortage of sperm donors soon. And then what will families who dearly wish for a child but need donor sperm do then?
Other families, like Gwenyth Jackaway and her son Dylan, are living in similar circumstances, but right now are not planning to sue anyone and say that they don’t blame their sperm bank. Dylan is five and conceived with donor sperm. He is also autistic, and so are three other children concived using sperm from the same donor, strongly indicating a genetic cause.
Currently, there isn’t a screening test for autism, and doctors aren’t even sure if there is a specific autism gene, so right now there’s no way that the sperm donor could have been tested.
Would Gweneth be happier if it had been possible to screen her son’s sperm donor for autism? Gweneth said that “I’ve done a lot of thinking about this, and to say yes to that is to say that I wish Dylan isn’t Dylan… I love my son and everything about him, and that means loving his autism also. Loving your children means loving everything about them. Our children don’t have autism; they are autistic. It’s part of who they are.”
Or when you have a child, you accept that you get what you get. And we have almost no control over how our child will turn out. If sperm donors are to undergo increasing amounts of screening, it leads to the inevitable question of what is screened for. Genetic diseases are obvious, but what about screening for appearance? Intelligence? Height? Physical ability? Personality traits?
So is the Brittany Donovan case a valid one to compensate a mentally impared child who will need medical care her whole life? Or does it feed a culture that expects perfection, even in it’s babies, and will sue if that’s not what is delivered? Or perhaps a little of both?
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