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Published: December 13, 2007

Egg donation – my gift to the world

The perils of in-vitro fertilization

When a freshman at the University of California, San Diego, Alexandra Gammelgard said she saw a provocative advertisement in the student newspaper. "It was like 'Be an angel,'” she recalled to the Dec. 8 Los Angeles Times. "'Make money for college. A family is looking for a donor.'"

The advertisement was looking for young women to donate their eggs for in-vitro fertilization. Like many college students, Gammelgard was in need of money, and answered the ad. Through two or three agencies, she donated her eggs, getting from $5,000 to $15,000 for each donation.

What she did not know was that she was a carrier for Tay-Sachs, a neurological disease that kills its victims generally before the age of 5. She discovered the fact when a couple who had used Gammelgard’s donated eggs informed the agency she had used that their child had the disease. Gammelgard had not been tested for the disease; she was not among the population at greatest risk to be carriers.

At least four couples have used Gammelgard’s eggs, and her stored eggs may yet be used by other couples. In the U.S., there is no mechanism for informing recipients of donated eggs of congenital defects the donors might suffer from once they are discovered. Unlike with blood donations, there is no tracking system.

The couple with the Tay-Sachs child are two men, Bruce Steiger and Rick Karl of Southern California -- the latter, said the Times, “raised a conservative Catholic.” Working through Surrogate Alternatives in Chula Vista, Steiger and Karl found Gammelgard. “She was tall, athletic and blond,” said the Times. “She cited no serious family health problems. The couple picked her based mostly on a picture and questionnaire.” She had written on the questionnaire, "I feel like egg-donating is my gift to give to the world."

Karl and Steiger said Surrogate Alternatives assured them that egg donors went through a thorough health screening. Though 10% of their $250,000 in fees for the procedure went to Surrogate Alternatives, the agency did not spend the $100 to $250 it costs to screen for Tay-Sachs. Fertility doctors, however, say that to screen for every possible disorder is unnecessary and would make the process too expensive. In Gammelgard’s case, since she said she was pure Scandinavian, the fertility doctor did not see the need to test for Tay-Sachs.

Gammelgard, however, informed the Times that she had some “Irish French Catholic” lineage, and French Canadians are among the groups most susceptible to Tay-Sachs. Her eggs were mixed with Karl and Steiger’s sperm. Karl, as it turned out, was also a Tay-Sachs carrier. The resulting child, Krystie, now two, has full-blown Tay-Sachs.

According to the Times, neither Gammelgard nor the agencies that arranged the donations have attempted to contact other couples who used Gammelgard’s eggs about her being a Tay-Sachs carrier. Vicken Sahakian, the Los Angeles area doctor who performed the procedure for Karl and Steiger, told the Times, "I can't go out and tell every agency in the country to watch out for this donor. I would be totally breaking the law because I would be revealing her [Gammelgard's] private information.”

Gammelgard said she has not contacted other agencies she’s worked with -- she said she cannot remember their names. "I kind of washed my hands of it," she told the Times, "and walked away."

© California Catholic Daily 2007. All Rights Reserved.