Decisions about our families are some of the most important we can make.

Many families today – an increasing number – rely on assisted reproduction, fertility treatments, and sperm and egg (also called gamete) donation to grow their families.

And many individuals choose to help others become parents by becoming gamete donors or surrogates.

When it comes to creating laws and policies about family building, everyone – children, parents, and the people who help them create families – must be represented in the decision-making process, to ensure the best outcomes.

To ensure security and stability for children and families, sound policy and practices around family building through fertility treatments, assisted reproduction, and gamete donation should:

• include legal clarity about who is a parent and who is a donor
• foster and support family relationships characterized by trust and transparency
• include professional systems of accountability that require medical professionals, clinics, banks, and programs to act in good faith, consistent with standards of care, and in accordance with representations made about their processes

At the same time, we should take care to avoid unintended harm. This means avoiding:

• regulations that mandate relationships between children and gamete donors in ways that can cause unintended negative consequences for children and families
• laws that introduce government intrusion into private reproductive and family choices
• the creation of government-run registries that infringe on privacy
• the introduction of new criminal penalties and restrictions in an area of essential health care – access to reproductive care – that is under attack across the country
• regulations that limit who can be a donor and who is able to access this path to family building;
  • such limits have a disproportionate negative impact on communities who have historically been harmed by practices and policies regulating reproduction–including people of color, low-income people, LGBQ people, transgender and non-binary people, and people with disabilities.

In the interest of furthering policy discussions that avoid harm and meet the needs of everyone involved, a group of researchers, attorneys, and organizations working on reproductive justice and assisted reproduction and representing children and families of LGBTQ+ parents have collaborated on the following statement of principles and policy positions on gamete provision.