To celebrate the 40-year anniversary of the announcement that a child had been born following egg donation for the first time, PET (the Progress Education Trust) produced an online event entitled '40 Years of Egg Donation and Counting: What Have We Learned? What Happens Next?'

This was the first PET event scheduled specifically to engage an Australian audience. The event commemorated the first birth of a child conceived using a donor egg, which occurred in Australia in November 1983, although announcement of the birth was delayed until January 1984 (at the egg recipient's request, and also to allow time to confirm the donor's genetic contribution via testing). Three of the four speakers at the PET event were based in Australia.

To kick things off, Sarah Norcross, director of PET, welcomed the audience, noting PET's hopes to do more events compatible with Australian time zones in the future.

The first guest speaker was none other than Professor Alan Trounson of Monash University, who was part of the team responsible for the first successful egg donation. He explained how he came to be involved in the early history of IVF.

It was fascinating to listen to Professor Trounson, who spoke so matter-of-factly about his research. His knowledge about animal embryology and work around creating artificial ovulation cycles in animals was, in his eyes, a natural foundation for translating these skills across to human reproduction. He noted toward the end of his presentation that the Australian government began drafting laws about egg donation in response to the first birth, but that these were not enacted until four years later. He phrased this problem as 'governments holding the key to progress', which was a fitting segue into the next speaker's presentation.

Stephen Page - director of Page Provan, a Queensland law firm that specialises in family and fertility law - was the second speaker. Page brought with him a unique perspective, both as the only non-academic speaker on the panel, but also as a parent of a child born using a donor egg.

Page raised two key points about reproductive donation in Australia: one was about the lack of national laws regarding gamete donation, which means individual states/territories each have different rules. The other concerns open donation: since 2004, all donor-conceived children in Australia are entitled to find out the identity of their donor once they turn 18. Furthermore, the state of Victoria was the first place in the world to retrospectively open donor records to donor-conceived children, giving people born before 2004 the opportunity to learn about their genetic parents (see BioNews 841).

Finally, Page compared regulation of donation in Australia to other countries around the world. Despite Australia's strict rules surrounding donation and surrogacy, prospective parents are allowed to travel internationally for fertility treatment. Page referred to one South African clinic, where donation is paid and anonymous, that saw two to three heterosexual Australian couples per business day.

The third speaker was Professor Catherine Mills, head of the School of Philosophical, Historical and International Studies at Monash University. As the former director of the Monash Bioethics Centre, Professor Mills focused on the ethics of egg donation in Australia. She cited a report from the Victorian Assisted Reproductive Treatment Authority that stated in 2020-2021, 81 percent of people who used donated material for reproductive purposes had a known donor, which Professor Mills referred to as a 'Bring Your Own Donor situation'! This information aligns with the Australian standards for egg donation, whereby the donor is not paid, the decision to donate is altruistic in nature, and the donor is only reimbursed for direct costs.

The final guest speaker – and the only non-Australian on the panel – was Professor Nicky Hudson from De Montford University in Leicester. Professor Hudson is leading an interdisciplinary research project (the 'EDNA' project) that is interested in understanding egg donation practices in a number of European countries, with a view of developing a holistic understanding of the egg donation experience.

An interesting finding from the EDNA project is that 62 percent of all egg donation cycles occur in Europe, which was poignant given that Australia was the country that pioneered egg donation. To wrap up, Professor Hudson also made mention of some emerging tools that may be used to aid in the selection of donors in the future, such as artificial intelligence.

After the guest speakers had finished presenting, viewer questions were presented to the panel for discussion. A question about retrospective transparency for donor-conceived children sparked engaging discussion from all speakers, with Page's firsthand surrogacy experience illuminating a key point: there is a distinction between donor-conceived children with same-sex parents versus heterosexual parents, since same-sex parents cannot hide the necessity of a donor, whereas heterosexual parents can. This discussion also featured consideration technologies such as reverse image searching and ancestry tests, technologies which are making it increasingly easy for recipients of donor material to identify their donors.

Another question about shortage of donors in countries like Australia prompted Professor Hudson to suggest that a shortage might be due to a lack of action from clinics themselves, who are not making patients aware of the possibility of donation. In contrast, Professor Mills suggested that Australian culture is not one that is widely aware of or engaged in discussions about reproductive donation. Although there is a public egg bank in Victoria, the likes of which have been seen in the UK, it is not well known.

All in all, the event was a success, shining a light on the research that both made egg donation possible and has evolved subsequently ever since. The range of perspectives was broad, the flow of presentations was cohesive, and there was a massive number of audience questions.

PET is grateful to Gedeon Richter UK Ltd for supporting this event. Gedeon Richter has had no input into the content or speaker selection, and reviewed slides for factual accuracy only.