Egg donors abroad - exploitation and risks of donation

How desperate women around the world are risking their lives to feed a booming - and deeply disturbing - trade in donor eggs.
Somewhere in the world, Nastya Kanatova has three children. She doesn’t know if they’re boys or girls, she has no idea if they have her blue eyes and button nose — and she never will. Five years ago, the Russian was so poverty stricken that she cashed in on the one commodity she had left of any real value — her fertility.

Her husband had left her, she had two young children to feed and little income. In desperation she sold her eggs, on six occasions, receiving £200 a time from a local IVF clinic. The resulting embryos were implanted in British, German and Russian women.

‘I was told three babies were born,’ she says of the transaction. ‘At the time, I had no special feelings towards them — I was giving my genetic material, nothing else.

'I was happy to know that my eggs would help someone who was desperate to have the joy I get from my own children. But, as time went on, I found myself tormented by questions. ‘In dark moments, I feel a sense of loss about them, an emptiness. I have ­children I will never know. I ask myself: “Are these children OK? Are they happy? Will they ever feel deprived by not knowing fully about themselves, never knowing their biological mum?” Because, in the end it’s not just ­biology, is it? It’s human emotion, too. I gave them life, yet I feel consumed by guilt.’

Her emotions are not unusual. Around the world, demand for human eggs far outstrips supply — a situation that can lead to women such as ­Nastya being exploited and then left to deal with the mental and physical consequences. And with the global market booming, things are unlikely to change.

Kylie Minogue recently announced that egg donation was an option she and her partner, Spanish model Andres Velencoso, were now considering, fearing that ­treatment for breast cancer will have affected her ability to conceive naturally. And only last week the Mail revealed how Carole Hobson, a single 58-year-old former barrister, is expecting twins after becoming pregnant with eggs donated by a 24-year-old Indian woman.

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