Number of sperm and egg donors

About these figures

It is important to note that the number of newly registered donors does not necessarily reflect how much sperm is available for use in treatment. For example, donors who register in one year may donate in subsequent years - but they will only be recorded once as a ´new donor´. In other cases, the sperm donated may only be used for one patient.

HFEA ID for donors

The HFEA plans to implement HFEA ID for donors (a unique identifier for each donor) by the summer of 2009. Before then, we are undertaking a review of the way we collect and publish information to ensure that it is as robust and accurate as possible. For example, the figures we currently publish may include duplicates where an individual donor has registered again at a different clinic.

Alongside the introduction of HFEA ID, we aim to provide updated figures on egg, sperm and embryo donors. However, we will not be producing updated figures for all previous years at that time.

 
Number of sperm and egg donors registered with the HFEA - updated 4 December 2007.

 

Donor registration at centres per year

 Year Sperm donors   Year  Egg donors  Egg share donors
(subset of total
egg donors)
 Year
 2000  325  2000  1242    
 2001  328  2001  1315    
 2002  278  2002  1179    
 2003  255  2003  1056    
 2004  247  2004  1064  2004  500
 2005  259  2005  956  2005  409
 2006  307  2006  812  2006  323

 

Monthly breakdown of donor figures

2004

   Sperm donors          Egg donors           Egg share donors
(subset of total
egg donors)
 Jan  20  Jan   81  Jan   36
 Feb  27  Feb   60  Feb  25
 March  25  March  114  March  54
 April  31  April   77  April  35
 May  24  May  103  May  42
 June  21  June  101  June   44
 July  9  July  80  July  46
 Aug  10  Aug  106  Aug  56
 Sep  22  Sep  75  Sep  40
 Oct  16  Oct  85  Oct  43
 Nov  20  Nov  106  Nov  46
 Dec  22  Dec  76  Dec  33
 Total  247    1064    500

 

2005

   Sperm donors    Egg donors   Egg share donors
(subset of total
egg donors)
 Jan  16  Jan  103  Jan  40
 Feb  26  Feb  105  Feb  36
 March  33  March  93  March  38
 April  24  April  61  April  27
 May  16  May  76  May  42
 June  14  June  81  June  38
 July  20  July  76  July  34
 Aug  24  Aug  91  Aug  41
 Sep  18  Sep  74  Sep  29
 Oct  30  Oct  63  Oct  28
 Nov  28  Nov  72  Nov  26
 Dec  10  Dec  61  Dec  30
 Total  259    956    409

 

2006

 Sperm donors    Egg donors   Egg share donors
(subset of total
egg donors)
 Jan  38  Jan  77  Jan  26
 Feb  21  Feb  81  Feb  36
 March  29  March  69  March  34
 April  30  April  60  April  22
 May  29  May  86  May  40
 June 15   June  57  June  25
 July  19  July  63  July   28
 Aug  37  Aug  63  Aug  26
 Sep  14  Sep  87  Sep  38
 Oct  35  Oct  69  Oct  21
 Nov  28  Nov  54  Nov  13
 Dec  12   Dec   46   Dec   14 
 Total  307    812    323

 

These figures are subject to constant verification and may vary slightly with each update.

 

Back to facts and figures

 

The information that we publish on our website is a snap shot of data provided to us by licensed centres at a particular time. This information may be subject to change as individual centres notify us of amendments. Before publication, we perform a preliminary validation process on the data, and ask the centres to confirm its accuracy for which they remain responsible.

Last updated: 11 November 2008