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Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by dopamean on Thursday October 03, 2019 @10:50AM (#21147649)
I dont understand why he cares? Also how could a clinic guarantee a specific number? Don't they normally implant (wrong word?) more embryos since they don't all take and that's how people sometimes end up with twins or triplets?
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by Donald on Thursday October 03, 2019 @10:58AM (#21147782)
If you watch his press conference, he seems to be taking a public health angle. He has three sons within his marriage in the same region as his 17 in vitro children. There's increased risk of inbreeding between these 20 people who (unknowingly to one another) share significant genetic material.

https://www.oregonlive.com/news/2019/10/oregon-doctor-says-h...

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by SkyBelow on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:37AM (#21148219)
Is that really a health concern though? Single generation shouldn't have risks higher than some already at risk people have no matter who they partner with.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by reitanqild on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:43AM (#21148298)
What I've learned is that there's significant risk even for cousins who have children together, so even more for half siblings.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by pgeorgi on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:59AM (#21148489)
... if the cousins' parents and grandparents are similarly closely related to each other, yes. Otherwise probably not.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by jacobolus on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:18PM (#21148692)
My understanding is that 1 generation of first-cousin marriage is very low risk.

The problem comes when you have many generations of family marriages in a row.

The Catholic church tried to make cousin marriages taboo as a way to break up clans and solidify church power.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by blueblimp on Friday October 04, 2019 @02:38AM (#21155359)
You're right. It's weird that people are rushing in here to defend inbreeding.

What people might not realize is even when there's not a specific disease caused by the inbreeding, there is still an overall negative effect on health, "inbreeding depression".

Here is a paper that estimates the effect in humans: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26131930.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by blueblimp on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:10PM (#21148621)
Anything first cousin or closer is bad. Second cousin is kinda bad. Third cousin is OK if it's not happening all the time.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:20PM (#21148717)
> There's increased risk of inbreeding between these 20 people who (unknowingly to one another) share significant genetic material.

Which is why this whole thing is immoral (not to mention dangerous) to begin with. How can you not assign children to both the (real/biological) father and mother to keep track of these things?

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by hackinthebochs on Thursday October 03, 2019 @01:00PM (#21149149)
The danger of inbreeding is overblown. It generally takes multiple generations of repeated inbreeding for genetic anomalies to develop.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by mlyle on Thursday October 03, 2019 @01:41PM (#21149679)
Half sibling (or uncle/aunt) inbreeding is considerably higher risk than first cousin interbreeding. Only sibling is worse.

I have 2 recessive things that I know I carry, thanks to genetic screening. If I boinked a half sibling, they'd probably be a carrier of 1 of them, and there's a 50-50 chance any resultant offspring would have the conditions.

(Neither would be fatal but both would be severe chronic things-- e.g. hemachromatosis.

There's probably other rarer recessive things that I'm a carrier of and don't even know about.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by dragonwriter on Thursday October 03, 2019 @03:38PM (#21151157)
> I have 2 recessive things that I know I carry, thanks to genetic screening. If I boinked a half sibling

...you could take steps to assure safety first, thanks to genetic screening.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by mlyle on Thursday October 03, 2019 @07:32PM (#21153362)
Sure, but A) genetic screening only knows about the common issues, and B) if you marry someone random and don't realize they're a half sibling, you might not bother with genetic screening.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Thursday October 03, 2019 @01:31PM (#21149545)
It doesn't change the argument. The fact that the father does not know who his offspring are (and the other way around) is quite bizarre to say the least.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by icebraining on Thursday October 03, 2019 @01:59PM (#21149881)
Bizarre is sending messages across hundreds of miles using electrified sand. Men impregnating women and moving on is as old as large scale war, at least.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Thursday October 03, 2019 @02:38PM (#21150429)
We're not in a large scale war. Today, this behavior is seen as desirable, without realizing what the effects are.

It's selfish behavior on both the donor and the recipient, and who ends up paying for it are the offspring and most likely society as well.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by icebraining on Thursday October 03, 2019 @04:26PM (#21151777)
> We're not in a large scale war.

No, but we're in a large society where men can and do have sex with women (consensually or not) once and leave them pregnant. I'm not making a moral judgement, I'm saying that mostly anonymous sperm donations have been happening long before IVF and sperm banks were a thing, so the results aren't as unpredictable as you paint them.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Thursday October 03, 2019 @04:39PM (#21151923)
So let's just enable this behavior even more, on an even larger scale? What you described happens, but it's not comparable to this. A single man's sperm can now be used to impregnate several women with a much lower barrier (as we can see from the article posted here). This issue has also been reported elsewhere, it's clearly becoming more wide spread, and we don't know what we're getting ourselves into, all because of greed and selfishness.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by hackinthebochs on Thursday October 03, 2019 @03:02PM (#21150754)
The probability of harm to potential offspring does in fact change the moral argument (which seems to be what you were going for).
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Friday October 04, 2019 @10:31AM (#21158072)
Hypothetically, even if it didn't harm the offspring, it must be kept track of who are their real parents.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by buboard on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:25PM (#21148774)
because genetic testing will also exist in the future
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:27PM (#21148794)
It's not a solution. Not everyone is going to get tested before they get married.

It's interesting how far left/liberal culture today mocks communities that have cousin marriages as "inbred" and "backward", yet they engage in severe and reckless practices that we have no idea how they're going to pan out.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by taco_emoji on Thursday October 03, 2019 @01:00PM (#21149143)
What does "liberal culture" have to do with sperm donation?
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Thursday October 03, 2019 @01:33PM (#21149579)
Conservative cultures don't allow this practice, they generally still strongly hold to the family as the building unit of society, whereas this practice continues to dismantle it.

We're ending up in a society where people don't know who their offspring are, and where children don't know who their real parents are. This is untrodden ground, and may very well have extremely serious consequences.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by buboard on Thursday October 03, 2019 @03:43PM (#21151243)
i really don't see why. back then there was no IVF and donor sperm would be a way for good old fashioned conservative couples who cant conceive to have the children they always wanted
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Thursday October 03, 2019 @04:41PM (#21151947)
A conservative couple won't use a sperm donor. The woman will literally be carrying another man's child, not her husband's.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by buboard on Thursday October 03, 2019 @07:00PM (#21153165)
What makes you say so? They wouldn't adopt a kid too? I don't think it's a "left" issue at all for couples. For single mothers, maybe
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Friday October 04, 2019 @10:35AM (#21158118)
Adoption is different if done properly. The adopted child should not in anyway be implied or declared to be of the same bloodline as the adopting parents, otherwise we'll end up with the same issue seen here. It's also important that the child know that they're adopted from early on, and not hide that fact.

Whereas artificial insemination is literally having the woman carry another man's child, it goes against conservative values (would they let another man sleep with the woman to impregnate her if there weren't artificial insemination?)

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by buboard on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:31PM (#21148837)
I 'm pretty sure they will / especially if they don't know their biological father.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by aidenn0 on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:54PM (#21149088)
1. Not everybody knows that they don't know their biological father.

2. My wife is adopted, has had some contact with her biological mother, but zero reliable information on her biological father (her bio mom lies about pretty much everything). She has shown no interest in the various genetic tests out there, even though she has to keep on writing on those health forms at her doctor "unknown" for all the "Does X run in your family" questions.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by buboard on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:59PM (#21149135)
understand. i would assume though that people who are missing info about one of their parents are more likely to use those services
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by daveFNbuck on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:02AM (#21147837)
The fertility clinic told him the kids would all be out-of-state. Some of the kids live near him and go to the same school and church as his kids. People who don't know they're siblings shouldn't live close enough to each other to become romantically involved.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by amanaplanacanal on Thursday October 03, 2019 @01:36PM (#21149613)
Well, some percentage of kids have fathers other than the ones they are aware of, since long before IVF was a thing. That's just life. Unless you and your potential mate get tested, you could always be half siblings. You have no way to know.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by pessimizer on Thursday October 03, 2019 @02:27PM (#21150276)
This isn't just life, it's a business that failed to live up to its contract.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by apta on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:23PM (#21148758)
> The fertility clinic told him the kids would all be out-of-state.

As if this excuses this sort of behavior.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by taco_emoji on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:59PM (#21149134)
What sort of behavior?
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by onion2k on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:02AM (#21147830)
I dont understand why he cares?

Two of the children contacted him first. That might have been just them innocuously looking for their biological parent, or it might have been a demand for parental support. If it's the latter then having 17 or more children potentially making a demand on him would make a big difference to his life.

Also how could a clinic guarantee a specific number?

They could count the number of successful children born with sperm from a donor and stop using that donation once there are 5 children.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by dopamean on Thursday October 03, 2019 @02:44PM (#21150516)
That all makes sense but I still don't think guaranteeing a specific number is possible. Say they had 4 successful births an are going for a 5th to reach the limit. We'll they'll implant more than 1 because that's how IVF works and so more than 5 could be born. I definitely get that 17 means they just ignored his wish entirely. I was just trying to point out that guaranteeing a specific number doesn't seem like a reasonable/possible thing to do.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by silencio on Thursday October 03, 2019 @03:28PM (#21151053)
the limit is typically measured in families, and within those families we’re usually not talking a dozen children each. a sperm bank that limits to 10 families per donor will probably end up in the ballpark of 10-20 children. (10 families is a very conservative limit - most banks go higher.) there can be a mad scramble to buy “sibling” vials from an otherwise retired donor if a family decides that they are done with extra vials.

ivf nowadays is also very much more strict about what you transfer. i did ivf a few months ago and we only transferred one PGS tested, day 5 embryo because a second one was not going to do anything good for me or the pregnancy odds.

2-3 decades ago both the tech and the feelings around donor identities and limits were very different. but nowadays we’re moving towards smaller limits and open identity of some sort, while fewer donor gametes are necessary for people to get pregnant. it’s curious.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by benatkin on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:01PM (#21148523)
It seems like he feels responsible for the ones he's met. They're no longer strangers. What would it be like for them to fall on hard times? He might be feeling the need to help them proactively, perhaps by putting them through college, and this is something he might need money from the lawsuit in order to do.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by quanticle on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:51AM (#21148395)
It's a breach of contract, plain and simple. If he had a written agreement that his sperm would be used to father 5 children and no more, and the clinic violated that, then he is entirely within his rights to sue the clinic for reneging on its half of the deal.

As for guaranteeing a specific number, first, if they couldn't guarantee that, why would they agree to the limit in the first place? And even if the guarantee was violated without intent, I would expect perhaps 6 or 7 children... not 17.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by akerro on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:57AM (#21148460)
>alleges that the OHSU clinic used his 1989 sperm donation to father at least 17 children—some who live in his area—despite him making an agreement with the clinic at the time that his sperm would be used for no more than five children, all born to women living out of the state.

>Some go to the same school as the kids he has with his wife.

That's so awkward and uncomfortable for me to even think about it, being in this situation...

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by ackshually on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:01AM (#21147806)
Breach of contract on location and number increases the possibility of accidental inbreeding for his children and those children concieved with his sperm without his knowledge. Very possible if those children go to the same school etc.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by filoleg on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:33PM (#21148861)
Yep, your guess was exactly on point, as the article mentions.

>Some go to the same school as the kids he has with his wife.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by GavinMcG on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:03AM (#21147851)
Do you not care when your expectations are breached?

The objection that the clinic couldn't actually guarantee a specific number of children doesn't hold water since they could have stopped using his sperm once the 5th child was born.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by Spooky23 on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:11AM (#21147933)
It sounds like there were conditions (don't use it in this region, no more than 5 kids, etc) that weren't met.

For IVF, the best practice is to implant 3-4 embryos, sometimes less when the woman doesn't have fertility issues. Obviously circumstances vary and IVF results in more multiples, but you're not going to get 5 sets of triplets if the clinic is doing what they agreed to do.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by silencio on Thursday October 03, 2019 @03:40PM (#21151198)
current best practice is no longer that high unless you have very low quality early embryos and the eggs are from someone that is 38+ years old. even 3 can be pushing it.

i had genetically tested day 5 blastocysts with my last cycle and most fertility doctors will not dare transfer more than one of those at a time regardless of age. but that is the best quality to transfer nowadays.

nobody wants to optimize for multiples any more since the rate of issues for both the embryos and the gestational parent are pretty high.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by meristem on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:40PM (#21148929)
The number of live births (rate of success) has increased; even with older mothers there is a push for 1 or two implanted embryos at a time.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by scvsafewfdsvf on Thursday October 03, 2019 @03:20PM (#21150963)
by the birthday paradox the odds of incest are quite high

Let's assume his 17 kids (k) are locals. Let's say he lives in a city with 1 million people. That's 500000 potential other sex mates (assuming hetero) We're only interested in people more less our age, about 20% of the population (actually much smaller), so 100 000 = N

Chance of incest = 1 - p where p = N!/(N^k (N-k)!)

Using the sterling's approximation, and that half his kids are opposite gender, k -> k / 2 = 6.5

About 2 in 10 000 chance of incest. Which are really high for something many people consider worse than death.

Now, my assumption of 20% is too generous. What if it's 10%, and he has more, undiscovered kids (presumably who haven't gotten tested)? Let's say 30 kids (it's happened)

1 in 2 thousand for every mate. You wouldn't get into a car that had those odds of a fatal accident, never mind 6, 10, 30 times.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by SamBam on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:48AM (#21148363)
> Also how could a clinic guarantee a specific number?

Either they shouldn't have guaranteed this, and made it clear that they couldn't, or they should have abided by the agreement. Either way, the clinic is at fault.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by abhorrence on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:06AM (#21147888)
Clinics are often only involved in the “getting pregnant” stage. They rely on reports of live birth to determine when they should stop using a particular donor.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by TomVDB on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:01AM (#21147827)
One of the reasons he cares is because of the chance of incest.

Some of his kids went to the same schools and churches.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by mmjaa on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:14AM (#21147969)
Why should he care? Because there is clearly a lack of regulation over the sperm-donor industry. It is extremely dangerous for men to make these deposits.

A friend of mine made a deposit in a sperm donor bank prior to getting a vasectomy. Two years later, he met a woman, who he dated for a few weeks before breaking it off.

9 months later, he was presented with child support demands from the state. She had stalked him, determined he had made a deposit in the sperm bank, then specifically chosen his profile to get pregnant.

He is now liable for child support, whether he likes it or not, for the rest of his life (California, in case its of importance). They didn't have sex - she stalked him, got artificially inseminated, and then went to the state to extract money from him. He now has a kid he never wanted, and is resigned to being a father to the child, even though he never planned it and it was forced upon him by a criminal stalker.

This highlights just how dangerous it is for men to use these services. Clearly, more regulation and oversight is required - especially if sperm banks are making their own decisions about how their resources are applied.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by lalaland1125 on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:08PM (#21148590)
Either your friend was lying or he should get a better lawyer.

The relevant law in California states that sperm donors are not legal parents: “The donor of semen provided to a licensed physician and surgeon or to a licensed sperm bank for use in assisted reproduction of a woman other than the donor’s spouse is treated in law as if he were not the natural parent of a child thereby conceived, unless otherwise agreed to in a writing signed by the donor and the woman prior to the conception of the child,” states California Family Code 7613.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by magduf on Tuesday October 08, 2019 @04:28PM (#21196846)
>Either your friend was lying or he should get a better lawyer.

This is the problem with people saying "this isn't legal in America": it's all based on how good your lawyer is, and if you can't afford Johnny Cochrane, you get screwed, no matter what the law says.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by mmjaa on Monday October 07, 2019 @04:08AM (#21178511)
My friend didn't lie. The reason he is liable is because he dated her, a fact she kept evidence of, in order to present at the alimony hearing. The judge assumed this was enough to prove his responsibility for the child she then conceived (without him). That's the crux.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by lalaland1125 on Thursday October 10, 2019 @09:36PM (#21220811)
This is why you have the right of discovery in court cases. He could simply show that she was lying by demonstrating that she got sperm from the sperm bank. (Alternatively, he could have proven that he had a vasectomy before they dated). Both of those two things leave hard medical records.

Like I said before, either your friend lied or he needs a better lawyer. Given the story that you stated, the law is definitely on his side.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by mmjaa on Friday October 11, 2019 @02:50AM (#21222123)
He did all that. The judge decided he needed to pay child support anyway. The rights of the child were greater than that of my friend.

Anyway, he fought back and is now a very dedicated father. He has visitation rights, and soon enough the childs decision to move in with her Dad, because her Mom is a criminal, will be ratified in court ..

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by silencio on Thursday October 03, 2019 @03:47PM (#21151303)
agreed. time to talk to a lawyer. also maybe the sperm bank, as it’s not trivial at most of them to discover who the donor is to that degree. certainly makes me raise an eyebrow that the timing was so perfect too.

i have a further thought - i am a legal owner of an “intimate partner” storage account where my partner’s sperm is stored for only my use as their spouse. even with the very very low FDA testing/paperwork bar for this type of account, there’s a paper trail that can be followed and a chain of custody for every single vial ever used. they’ll have even more documentation if the friend’s sperm was ever for sale.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by SmellyGeekBoy on Thursday October 03, 2019 @11:40AM (#21148256)
There will be records for the vasectomy and the insemination that could be subpoena'd by a court, no?
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by magic_beans on Thursday October 03, 2019 @02:22PM (#21150187)
Your friend must have realized that there was a possibility of his future child (or multiple future children) seeking him out one day. You don't donate to a sperm bank if you NEVER want to have a kid. Did he need $40 that badly?

Your friend was not very wise here.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by magduf on Tuesday October 08, 2019 @04:30PM (#21196876)
Maybe he wanted to help infertile couples to have a child, and thought he could offer good genetics to such couples, with the agreement that he wouldn't be financially responsible for the children. He never intended to offer his genetic code to a psycho stalker who abused his donation in order to get him on the hook for 18 years of child support.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by codegeek on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:44PM (#21148970)
"specifically chosen his profile to get pregnant"

So can he not prove this in court ? Sure it still adds hassle for him to go through all this legal stuff. But it is not like he just has to shut up and pay IF what you said is true.

Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by mmjaa on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @05:50AM (#21201600)
He did go to court. She lied and said she got pregnant by him when they were dating.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by fulvous on Thursday October 03, 2019 @12:13PM (#21148646)
Does it matter why? If they agreed to it and then broke that agreement that is a problem.
Re:After discovering he has at least 17 kids, man sues ferti... by Circuits on Thursday October 03, 2019 @10:57AM (#21147766)
Well I think it's obvious why he cares... his children are trying to reach him. As for guaranteeing a specific number of children, no I don't believe they would be able to do that. However, I think the problem is not that they can not guarantee a specific number of children. The problem is that they guaranteed a specific number of woman who would be impregnated with his sperm but have gone well beyond the number they gave him.