PET is on the advisory board of the ConnecteDNA Project and our director, Sarah Norcross, was delighted to attend an event to mark the project's completion.
Professor Lucy Frith led the project and welcomed everyone to an afternoon of conversations and celebrations!
The ConnecteDNA project is a collaboration between researchers at the University of Manchester, the University of Liverpool, De Montfort University, the University of Warwick and the University of Birmingham.
The aim of the project is to explore how people involved in donor conception both use and are impacted by the rise in direct-to-consumer genetic testing. Four researchers gave brief outlines of their findings from the ConnecteDNA Project.
The audience heard from Dr Leah Gilman about the relational implications of commercial DNA testing - looking at early contact between the donor conceived and the donor.
Dr Caroline Redhead discussed the the possibility of law reform. She invited us to think about changes to which parties in donor conception get access to what information and when.
Dr Petra Norqvist considered the challenges that may arise trying to navigate contact between a donor-conceived person and their donor after a connection via DNA testing has been made.
Finally, Professor Fiona MacCallum invited the audience to think about the impact of discovering you are donor conceived may have on your sense of identity.
There followed a number of talks giving different perspectives on donor conception and direct-to-consumer genetic tests including one from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority.
Sarah Norcross chaired the final session which was a policy discussion. The main issue under the spotlight was the ten-family limit. There is a ten-family limit in effect in the UK for gamete donors, but there are no such restrictions on the number of families that can be created abroad using sperm or egg donations made in the UK. See BioNews for further information. PET also produced an event on this topic in May this year.
It was a great afternoon and although it was badged as marking the end of the project, we expect to hear much more from the project team in the coming months.
