900 donors wanted at sperm bank

A sperm bank in Beijing is calling for young, healthy Chinese males to help ease a severe shortage, and pledges to reward each with 5,000 yuan ($750) for a successful series of donations.

The sperm bank of Peking University Third Hospital said on Monday that it urgently needs 900 donors, and is calling for volunteers to register in August and September.

The volunteers must be Chinese, between 20 and 45, living in Beijing and having no inherited or infectious diseases, such as hepatitis B and color blindness, according to the hospital.

In addition, they are required to have a junior college or a higher degree, the hospital said.

Registered donors will have two physical checkups, and those qualified will have to donate several times within six months to get all the money, the hospital said.

"We have taken many measures to encourage sperm donation in the past, but few people have donated," said Yang Dongping, a publicity official at the hospital. "There are many couples who are infertile."

About 15 percent of married couples in Beijing and neighboring Tianjin are infertile, and 40 percent of them fail to get pregnant because of sperm problems, according to the hospital. Due to high demand and a lack of supply, couples in many places in China have to wait as long as two years, the hospital said.

Peking University Third Hospital is one of China's top medical institutions in assisted reproductive technology, such as in vitro fertilization. The first IVF baby on the Chinese mainland was born in the hospital in 1988.

Many other medical institutions in China have also encouraged sperm donation to ease the gap between supply and demand, Yang said.

Hubei Sperm Bank, affiliated with Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, Hubei province, said in an advertisement last year that it was offering young males a "new solution to buying an iPhone 6S". The sperm bank said it would provide a total subsidy of 5,000 yuan to every male who donated successfully.

Many reasons are behind the shortage of sperm donors in China, including a traditional belief that sperm is precious to health and should not be lost, said Zhao Bangrong, a doctor in andrology at Hebei Reproductive Medicine Center, in Shijiazhuang, Hebei province.

In addition, sperm banks usually adopt strict standards when selecting donors to ensure that donated sperm are the highly active. This disqualifies most donors, he said.

wangxiaodong@chinadaily.com.cn