In an article about a recommended change in Australian law that would give children greater rights to know about their sperm donor, IVF professor Gab Kovacs said, retrospectively changing the law would be “un-Australian and unfair”.

In a letter to the editor, “Ian Smith” responded:

Professor Gab Kovacs says he is “worried about men who donated over 25 years ago, and may not have subsequently told their current partners about the donation” (”Sperm donor law must put child first, says Napthine”, 16/6). I am one such man. In 1986 I responded to a call by Professor Kovacs for sperm donors. I know I have seven offspring born from my donations. I also have two children born in my marriage. I have joined the voluntary registry.

Undoubtedly it will be complex for me and my family if and when any of my donor offspring choose to make contact with me. However, I believe the Premier is right; people born from donor conception and who want to have information about their genetic heritage have a fundamental right to do so.

I understand that Professor Kovacs feels he must keep that promise of anonymity. However, it was a promise wrongly made. The injustice to those whose lives were created is profound and it should be rectified.

Indeed. Thousands of donor conceived people have a deep longing to know where they came from, who they look like, whether they have any biological siblings and sometimes even why they’ve developed some genetic disease. Many of them are speaking out about being unfairly stripped of their right to a connection to their biological roots.

From the beginning, third party reproduction has been putting the desires of adults over the best interest of children. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church rightly states, these technologies “infringe the child’s right to be born of a father and mother known to him and bound to each other by marriage” (CCC 2376, emphasis mine). If we can’t stop the immoral practice of creating children in laboratories yet, the least we can do is not further dehumanize them by intentionally cutting them off from their biological heritage.