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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Science
Robyn Vinter North of England correspondent

UK women driven to unregulated sperm donors by high treatment costs, experts say

Pregnant woman
Registered donors do not have parental rights, are not required to pay child support and are contactable only by the child when they reach adulthood. Photograph: Andrew Matthews/PA

The high costs of having a child using a sperm donor are driving poor and marginalised women in the UK to use unregulated online services rife with “weirdos” and misogynists in order to have a child, experts have said.

In a ruling released on Wednesday, a Middlesbrough family court judge said a man who claimed to have fathered more than 180 children across the world as an unregistered sperm donor could not have custody of one of the children.

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