The younger a woman is when she signs up to be an egg donor, the more likely she is to do it for financial gain, a survey of European clinics has revealed.
A study performed by the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) has found that although the vast majority of donors are keen to help infertile couples for altruistic reasons, a large proportion also expect payment.
The society surveyed 1,423 egg donors at 60 clinics in 11 European countries during 2011 and 2012 by ESHRE’s Task Force on Cross-border Reproductive Care and European IVF Monitoring Consortium.
Those findings were presented yesterday by the chairman of the Task Force, Professor Guido Pennings of the Bioethics Institute Ghent, Belgium, at the annual meeting at the ExCel Centre in London, which runs from 7-10 July 2013.
He told delegates from across Europe that the donor’s age proved an important factor in her motivation to donate.
The overall average age of the donors in the study was 27.4 years – ranging from 25.6 in Spain to 31 years in France.
Of those, 46% of the donors under 25 said altruism alone was their motive compared to 79% of those over 35; 12% of those under 25 were purely financially motivated compared to 1% of those older than 35.
Other findings showed that around one third of all study donors had a university degree, and about half all donors had a child of their own
The study found that while altruism was the main reason for donating eggs, the majority of donors received financial compensation.
“The fact that a person receives compensation or money does not mean that she is motivated by that money,” said Professor Pennings.
However, the study made it clear that financial compensation is still an important motivation for many donors. In Greece, 40% of donors said their motivation was purely financial, while in Russia and Ukraine it was one of the main incentives.
The amount women receive varies across Europe, from nothing in France to 2000 Euros in Belgium. Most countries offered between 500 and 1000 Euros. The sums were recalculated as purchasing power in individual countries – for example, multiplied by four in Ukraine or two in Russia to assess their real value.
“In these countries egg donation may be very attractive to unemployed or poor women,” said Professor Pennings.
There were high levels of pure altruism in Belgium (86%), Finland (89%) and France (100%), but high levels of purely financial motivation in Greece (39%), Russia (47%) and Ukraine (28%).
In all, 46% said were motivated by pure altruism; 32% by a combination of altruism and financial gain; 10% were motivated purely by the financial benefits; 5% said they were motivated by altruism and their own treatment; and 2% by treatment alone.
Professor Pennings said the study demonstrated the diversity of donor population across European countries.
“This difference can be explained by different reimbursement systems and different legal rules of the donation practice in payment and anonymity,”, he said.
“In general, most European oocyte donors are motivated by the wish to help other women, but financial compensation surely helps persuade some of them to actually do it.”
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