Waiting time, increase in donations …: one year after the opening of the MAP to couples and singles, where are we?

On August 2, 2021, the revision of the bioethics law was promulgated, thus opening medically assisted procreation (MAP) to female couples and single women. A long-awaited law, but faulty in many waysboth on parentage scheme that has been put in place for lesbian couplesthe one on the failure to take into account the parenting projects of trans people.

Given that a year has passed, this is an opportunity to see if the feared explosion in demand has actually occurred and whether the number of gamete donations is up to date today.

Numerous requests for medically assisted procreation well above estimates

Between 1^uh January 31 and March 2022, 5,126 requests for first consultation were recorded from lesbian couples and single women, with relative equality, 47% from couples and 53% from single women. Over the same period, more than 2,500 consultations were carried out for this patient population.

By way of comparison, in the last three months of 2021 there were 6,800 requests for first consultations.

Also last spring the Biomedicine Agency had 53 attempts aimed at couples and single women.

A law that “defied all predictions”estimated today from echoes, the Director General of the Biomedicine Agency Emmanuelle Cortot-Boucher. The number of requests is indeed well above the projections made before the law, which predicted 4,000 new requests per year.

As for the deadline for resorting to sperm donation, it “Varies greatly from center to center”acknowledges the Biomedicine Agency, which nevertheless provides an average:

“Excluding this center, the average time taken for treatment was 13.6 months as of March 31, 2022, an increase of 1.6 months compared to the end of 2021. Taking into account all the centers, the average waiting time at the same date was 14.8 months. “

Delays that remain considerable and that still push those who have the means to go abroad, such as Mathilde and Amélie who want to start a family and go abroad to start a PMA course. Their testimony must follow Madmoizelle.

Gamete donation and access to origins: developments that have concrete impacts

Other questions remain unanswered, on the donation of gametes and on access to origins, as can be seen from Publication Maya, a single woman who initiated the MAP process: “I was told that the straws of the old regime, anonymous, and those of the new one, with the right of access to origins, would be used in parallel for some time. But I will be told, as a patient, which ones are used? It is very important for me, for the script that I will be able to give to the child. “

Because in a month, things will change on this point. Starting from September 1st this year, people who have already donated their eggs or sperm will be able to contact the Data Access Commission if they want people born from their donation to have access to non-identifying data and their identity. Likewise, people born of this gift will be able to contact this same Commission to request information.

It is also from next September 1st that people who want to donate their gametes will have to agree on the fact that people born thanks to this donation have majority access to non-identifying information and the identity of the donor. However, no kinship can be established between these individuals.

In the last year and with the entry into force of the revision of the bioethics law, the number of gamete donors has increased: in 2021 there are 600 sperm donors and 900 egg donors, a number never reached in the past. The sign ofa social change on the issue of gamete donationa long taboo subject?

According to the Biomedicine Agency, 22% of the population considers access to origins as an additional way of giving.

Right at the beginning of the summer, the Constitutional Council was considering the possibility for trans men to access MAP. Finally, it ruled that the exclusion of transgender men from MAP does not constitute a violation of equality.

Photo credit: Mikhail Nilov via Pexels