Love and Semen In A Time of War

NEWS FROM OPERATION PROTECTIVE EDGE

Earlier this year, it was reported that Haifa’s Rambam Hospital’s fertility clinic was in crisis. Supplies of sperm samples were low – dangerously low – to meet the demand. Donations were down, and screening was high. At Israel’s fifteen sperm banks, perhaps only 10% of donors make it through the screening, and we aren’t even counting the guys on Birthright Israel who drop by for a donation.

Now, this Summer, with growing Israeli patriotism, and a Hamas anthem on the radio, more and more women are not only ordering sperm samples and requesting them by the donors’ heights and eye and hair colors, but they are requesting the sperm of combat soldiers.

Of course, let’s put this into perspective. Rambam provides only about 650 samples a year, or a Baker’s Dozen a week.

The ideal profile of the donor is tall, well educated, a matching skin tone to the potential mother, nice hair, excellent health, and brave IDF service in a combat unit.

Rambam reports that over the past few weeks, half of the applicants requested donors with a combat history. Before Operation Protective Edge, this request rarely, if ever, came up.

It is unknown if mothers-to-be can request specific combat brigades.

Is the desire logical? That is not for me to decide; I am just relating a change in behavior among a consumer segment.

About 600 infants are born each year in Israel from donated sperm. Two private companies also provide samples. Cryobank, which operates in Rishon Lezion at Assouta Medical Center, only accepts sperm donations from army veterans, who are theoretically already screened for health and well-being. Tel Aviv’s Superm accepts samples only from men under thirty (as do most other worldwide banks).

Interested in donating? Please visit HERE.