10.6092/issn.2038-3460/17396
Despite a long history of assisted reproductive technologies including the use of IVF and artificial insemination, sperm donation has always been a difficult topic in China due to a number of political and sociocultural factors. The article will look at the cultural biases against sperm donation, that in the past have led to a severe shortage of sperm donors across the country’s provincial sperm banks. It will also look at the political and regulatory context of sperm donation, and it will explore new developments more recently that have transformed the perception of sperm donation and the attitudes among Chinese men to become sperm donors. In particular, it will look at the media controversy about sperm donation that followed the death of a sperm donor in Wuhan city in 2011, which served as an important catalyst to initiate wider public debate about sperm donation in the media. As the Chinese government is actively seeking to encourage more men to become sperm donors, and media organizations have taken a more active role in collecting, disseminating and transmitting information, this has changed the perception on sperm donation, at least to some degree. Today, there is a more knowledgeable and better informed (male) public, in particular among university students, who is more willing to become sperm donors than it was the case only five years ago. However, as much as this has changed, the end of China’s one-child policy in 2016 has put new pressures on an already strained system of supply and demand of donor sperm in the context of assisted reproductive technologies, as today even more couples are seeking to fulfill their reproductive wishes to also have a second child.
application/pdf
2038-3460
17396
1
en
Kerstin Klein
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/
Tecnoscienza – Italian Journal of Science & Technology Studies
assisted reproductive technologies
Transformations in the Public Perception of Sperm Donation in China. An Analysis of Media Debate in Chinese Newspapers in the 2010’s
Text.Serial.Journal
https://tecnoscienza.unibo.it/
9
Essays
2018-08-06
2023-06-25
2018-08-06
2023-08-28
29-48
TS
Kerstin Klein
2018/08/06
10.6092/issn.2038-3460/17396
29
Independent scholar
2038-3460
1
assisted reproductive technologies
en
48
Transformations in the Public Perception of Sperm Donation in China. An Analysis of Media Debate in Chinese Newspapers in the 2010’s
https://tecnoscienza.unibo.it/article/download/17396/16254
9
                                                                              Essay

Transformations in the Public
Perception of Sperm Donation in China
An Analysis of Media Debate in Chinese
Newspapers in the 2010’s
Kerstin Klein
Independent scholar


    Abstract: Despite a long history of assisted reproductive technologies
    including the use of IVF and artificial insemination, sperm donation has always
    been a difficult topic in China due to a number of political and sociocultural
    factors. The article will look at the cultural biases against sperm donation,
    that in the past have led to a severe shortage of sperm donors across the
    country’s provincial sperm banks. It will also look at the political and
    regulatory context of sperm donation, and it will explore new developments
    more recently that have transformed the perception of sperm donation and
    the attitudes among Chinese men to become sperm donors. In particular, it
    will look at the media controversy about sperm donation that followed the
    death of a sperm donor in Wuhan city in 2011, which served as an important
    catalyst to initiate wider public debate about sperm donation in the media.
    As the Chinese government is actively seeking to encourage more men to
    become sperm donors, and media organizations have taken a more active
    role in collecting, disseminating and transmitting information, this has
    changed the perception on sperm donation, at least to some degree. Today,
    there is a more knowledgeable and better informed (male) public, in
    particular among university students, who is more willing to become sperm
    donors than it was the case only five years ago. However, as much as this has
    changed, the end of China’s one-child policy in 2016 has put new pressures
    on an already strained system of supply and demand of donor sperm in the
    context of assisted reproductive technologies, as today even more couples
    are seeking to fulfill their reproductive wishes to also have a second child.

    Keywords: sperm donation; gametes; china; media analysis; assisted
    reproductive technologies.

    Corresponding author: Kerstin Klein, Archer Tower, Berger Rd, London
    E96FG, UK – Email: kerstin.s.klein@gmail.com




TECNOSCIENZA
Italian Journal of Science & Technology Studies
9 (1) pp. 29-48- ISSN 2038-3460
www.tecnoscienza.net                              2018
30                                                             Tecnoscienza – 9(1)

1. Introduction

    In February 2011, a 35-year-old doctoral student at Huazhong Uni-
versity of Science and Technology in Hubei Province fatally collapsed
during the process of making a sperm donation at the local sperm bank.
The case came to wider public attention when, in the following year, the
media reported that the donor’s father had taken the university to court,
claiming that the sperm bank was responsible for his son's death. The
case triggered a surge of media reports and changed the image of sperm
donation from a somewhat taboo topic that people did not talk about
even with close family and friends, to a new domain of public interest.
The paper will look at how, whilst tragic, the incident served as a crucial
breakthrough in China, to change the character of the media debate
about sperm donation, and to transform the (male) public’s perception of
issues surrounding it. In fact, sperm donation has been one of the most
controversial aspects of assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) in
China1.
    Artificial reproductive technologies have been a central object of re-
search in science and technology studies for several decades now, and nu-
merous studies have looked at the impact of ARTs in different national and
political cultures (e.g., Inhorn and Van Balen 2002; Strathern 1992). As
those undergoing ART treatments often rely on gametes (eggs and sperm)
or embryo donors, social scientists have also looked at the motivations of
donors in different countries and the impact of legislative contexts on the
diversity of donor populations (e.g., Mohr 2014; Pennings et al. 2014). This
study draws on two related bodies of literature in the Chinese context, one
that has explored the social and political conditions of reproduction (e.g.,
Handwerker 2002; Greenhalgh and Winckler 2005), and another that has
looked at human gamete and embryo donation (e.g., Klein 2010; Klein
2017; Liao, Dessein and Pennings 2010; Ping et al. 2011). China reported
the birth of its first IVF baby only ten years after the world's first baby was
conceived from IVF in England in 1978, and this marked the beginning of
China's intensive involvement with ARTs. What is different in China than
in most other countries is that the Chinese government does not permit the
donation of spare embryos leftover in IVF clinics for use by other infertile
couples (Klein 2010). From this follows that spare embryos can only be do-
nated for research purposes (e.g., stem cell research), or alternatively they
have to be discarded (MOH 2003), and only human gamete donation is
lawful. Many of the concerns surrounding the application of ARTs are
unique to China, where Confucian beliefs and values strongly influence the
debate. Although IVF has been long established and ‘routinized’ in China
over a period of more than three decades (Wahlberg 2016), and even
though artificial insemination (by both husband and donor) has been prac-
tised for an even longer period of time (Liao, Dessein and Pennings 2010)2,
sperm donation, although encouraged by authorities, has always been one
of the most controversial applications in the ART sector in China.
Klein                                                                       31
     Sperm donation serves as a remedy for the lack of male gametes in in-
fertile couples and satisfies the male partner’s desire to have a child, but it
also means that the couple will raise a child that is biologically unrelated
to the father. The absence of this genetic link poses a direct conflict with
Confucian norms and values, which many people still accept, especially in
rural areas of China. A child conceived with the help of a sperm donor is
difficult to accept, because Confucian filial duty strongly favours the bio-
logical link as it fits with a central Confucian value of ‘continuing the pat-
riline’ (Qiu 2002). From this vantage point, the implications for the sperm
donor are that he passes on his ancestral bloodline to strangers, which
would be akin to an insult to his family and ancestors, because the biolog-
ical father is not able to fulfil his filial duty for his unknown and
unacknowledged offspring (Heng 2009). Consequently, sperm donation
has been a highly controversial topic in China.
     The paper uses a qualitative approach to look at the media debate
about sperm donation. Chinese newspapers will be analysed with the help
of textual analysis. Following Fairclough (2003), newspaper articles, as
‘texts’, are elements of social events which have ‘causal effects’ and can
bring about change. For instance, texts can bring about changes in our
knowledge, beliefs, attitudes, values and so on. However, this causality is
not regular. According to Fairclough, it is not possible to say for instance
that particular features of texts automatically bring about certain changes
in people’s knowledge or attitudes, or particular social effects. Analysing
the causal effects of texts, what needs to be accounted for is that they are
embedded in “processes of meaning-making” (Fairclough 2003), and that
it is these ‘meanings’ that have social effects and can lead to change, ra-
ther than the texts as such. Such a methodological approach implies that
meanings and interpretations associated with these texts (newspaper arti-
cles) and their messages about sperm donation will be more relevant than
for instance the number of times they occur. The media analysis will pri-
marily draw on Chinese English-language media3, in particular but not
only the dailies ‘China Daily’ and ‘Global Times’4. The period of data col-
lection concentrates on the time when sperm donation became a topic of
wider public debate in China in 2011 until 2016, but the analysis will also
include newspaper articles from earlier years, as well as regulatory guide-
lines and scientific reports.
     In China’s system of media control, the Publicity Department of the
Communist Party of China (CPC) (sometimes still called by its old name
‘Propaganda Department’) coordinates with the General Administration
of Press Freedom to enforce media censorship and control of politically
sensitive and taboo topics (Stockmann 2013). Since President Xi Jinping
took office, he has asked for ‘absolute loyalty’ from the state media
(South China Morning Post 2016a), and censorship of all forms of media
organizations and content has tightened. Despite heavy government cen-
sorship, however, mainland Chinese media production has also turned in-
to an increasingly competitive market, offering diversified content and an
32                                                          Tecnoscienza – 9(1)

increase in investigative reporting. Many topics and political events are
strictly monitored and either considered to be taboo or sensitive, but
there are also some areas with less heavy state censorship, where journal-
ists enjoy greater freedoms in their journalistic expression. Sperm dona-
tion is not considered to be a politically sensitive topic, and government
authorities have in fact actively sought to overcome the deep-seated socio-
cultural prejudices against sperm donation prevalent among many Chi-
nese, which in the past have led to severe shortages among the country's
sperm banks. The paper will start with a discussion of the broader cultur-
al and regulatory context surrounding sperm donation in China. The me-
dia analysis will then include an analysis of central topics, meaning and
actors in the debate about sperm donation in Chinese newspapers. The
conclusions will make some final observations about the effects of the
media debate on the transformation of public perception.


2. Cultural and Regulatory Context of Sperm Donation in
China

     Confucianism is the main Chinese framework of norms and ethics by
which the new ARTs have been taken up and interpreted. Confucian
norms and values place a strong emphasis on the patrilineal tie between
ancestors and their descendants, and procreation is by far the most signif-
icant aspect of Confucian filial duty. Childlessness has always been re-
garded as a failure in one’s duty toward parents and ancestors (Heng
2009). Especially in rural areas, but not only, it is attached with social
stigma, which may not only affect the infertile couple but also their entire
family (Handwerker 1998; Ping et al. 2011). In the past, this has led to al-
ternative techniques of reproduction to bypass infertility or to get hold of
additional children, in particular if a couple was unable to bear a son, and
such alternatives included for instance adoption of (extra) sons or taking
concubines when a wife had not produced an heir (Klein 2017). Yet to-
day, ARTs offer entirely new ways to deal with infertility and to alleviate
the burden of childlessness. Since ARTs became available in China in the
late 1980’s, their development coincided with a unique biopolitical set-
ting, namely that of a mandatory birth limitation policy, allowing only one
child per couple (Greenhalgh and Winckler 2005). In her ethnographic
studies of Beijing’s emerging ART industry in the early 1990’s, Lisa
Handwerker has shown how in the context of government controlled re-
production, the availability of ARTs created new pressures for childless
couples to do everything they can to overcome infertility, and how there-
fore, paradoxically, the one-child policy came to be experienced as a ‘eve-
ryone must have one child policy’ (Handwerker 2002). When Deng
Xiaoping’s economic reforms since the late 1970’s culminated in the po-
litical reform project under Jiang Zemin at the turn of the millennium,
Klein                                                                         33
Greenhalgh and Winckler (2005) have shown, how the birth planning
policy overall shifted from a mass surveillance intrusion into all aspects of
people’s lives to a more ‘neoliberal’ and indirect form of regulatory con-
trol through new social actors and intermediary organizations. This shift
was characterized by two fundamental paradigm changes: firstly, a change
from a focus on ‘quantity’ to that of ‘quality of the population’, and sec-
ondly, a change from direct state regulation to greater self-regulation
through the market and by communities, families and individuals them-
selves. Under this ‘neoliberal’ influence, the one-child policy turned its
focus away from curbing the size of the population onto improving its
‘quality’, and as Handwerker (2002) has pointed out, this meant a new
focus on producing ‘the quality singleton’. This trend has been particular-
ly strong in urban areas and was exacerbated by the rise of new consumer
markets for infertility and ART treatments and a new culture of self-
regulating subjects obsessed with raising the quality of their single offspring.
    It was in the midst of this shift, when medical experts and fertility
providers in the late 1990's became increasingly unsatisfied with a vastly
expanding but unregulated ART industry. They increased their pressure
on the authorities to standardise and regulate the new medical sector, so
that ART clinics require state licenses to provide their services. It took
until 2001, when the former Ministry of Health (MOH), now the Nation-
al Health and Family Planning Commission (NHFPC)5, issued four new
regulations: two methods, the ‘Managerial Method for Human Assisted
Reproduction’ and ‘Managerial Method for Human Sperm Banks’, and
two technical standards, the ‘Technical Standard for Human Assisted
Reproduction’ and ‘Technical Standards for Human Sperm Banks’. In
2003, these methods and standards were amended, and the amendments
together with new ethical principles were incorporated into the currently
applicable set of legal guidelines, called the ‘Technical Standards and
Ethical Principles for Human Assisted Reproduction and Sperm Banks’
(henceforth referred to as MOH 2003). Under the new legal guidelines
(MOH 2003), single women, unmarried and same-sex couples are not
permitted to receive ART services, and those seeking to undergo fertility
treatment need to show their marriage certificates. The guidelines also re-
quire confidentiality of all involved persons including the identity of do-
nors, and sperm or gamete donors are guaranteed lifelong anonymity6.
Due to Confucian cultural sensitivities in China, which have the potential
to make a child conceived with the help of a donor difficult to accept, most
couples respect this anonymity principle, as it goes hand in hand with a se-
crecy rule common among Chinese families: when the act of using a sperm
donor is kept a secret, the rationale goes, the child will also never ask for his
or her genetic father's name (Liao, Dessein and Pennings 2010)7.
    There are 30 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities in
mainland China. Under current guidelines, each province can only have
one provincial sperm bank (MOH 2003)8, but not all provinces have
sperm banks yet. With more being planned, there are currently 23 li-
34                                                           Tecnoscienza – 9(1)

censed sperm banks. There are at least 178 licensed IVF clinics (Qiao and
Feng 2014) and approximately 30 licensed clinics offer artificial insemina-
tion services (Ping et al. 2011). All of these clinics rely on the supply of
sperm from sperm banks, hence there is a huge demand in donor sperm.
It has been estimated that around 10% of infertile couples turn to a
sperm bank for help (Shanghai Daily 2005). In large cities like Beijing,
Shanghai, Nanjing and Guangzhou, this means that over 10,0000 couples
hope to receive a sperm donation as soon as possible (Gong et al. 2009).
Long waiting lists and waits of up to two years cause some of them to give
up on their plans (Ping et al. 2011). For ethical reasons, China bans any
form of commercial sperm banks, which means that sperm cannot be
traded or acquired for a payment (MOH 2003). The ART regulations fur-
ther define strict eligibility criteria for sperm donors. They must be be-
tween 22 and 45 years old, heterosexual, in good health, and they are re-
quired to undergo a series of physical and psychological evaluations
(MOH 2003). Serologic and genetic testing aims to identify those at high
risk for sexually transmitted infections and hereditary genetic diseases,
such as for instance HIV, Hepatitis B and C, syphilis, gonorrhoea, myco-
plasma, chlamydia, and numerous other conditions. This and a density
threshold of at least 60 million spermatozoa per ml of semen means that
many applicants fail at the first stage of the screening tests.
    The rate has been found to be so high that a sperm crisis and declin-
ing sperm quality have become of increasing concern and a subject of sci-
entific studies. For instance, a multicentre study of four major sperm
banks found that out of 19,471 prospective sperm donors between 2003
and 2009 only 6,467 men (33.2%) qualified to become donors (Ping et al.
2011). The main reasons for non-recruitment were found to be semen pa-
rameters below the required threshold (55%) or a positive test for sexual-
ly transmitted diseases (7.9%). One recent study found that of sperm do-
nor applicants in Hunan Province, 56% qualified in 2001 because their
sperm met standards of healthiness, whereas by 2015 only 18% qualified
(Huang et al. 2017, p. 88): “The semen quality in young men in China has
been declining over the past 15 years”, concluded the study, which in-
volved more than 30,000 men. It is generally believed that the main rea-
sons for the declining quality of sperm are changing lifestyles, which often
are associated with China's economic transformation from Communism
to a market society: such as long hours of sitting at the computer, stress,
irregular sleep schedules, increasing substance abuse, and environmental
pollution is also typically cited. However, an increased perception of de-
clining sperm quality is not particular to China, as researchers around the
globe have warned for years that the male sperm count is in a state of de-
cline. It is difficult to know whether sperm quality is in a state of decline
or whether there are biases in the study populations, but it is unlikely that
the rate could have fallen that much9.
    When applicants pass the screening tests, they face a lengthy donation
process from the initial tests to delivering the required amount of semen.
Klein                                                                      35
In addition to at least three visits for screening, a complete donation of
usually 17-40 ml of semen (as required per individual sperm bank) re-
quires approximately 10-15 visits at intervals of 5-7 days. All samples have
to be frozen for a period of at least six months from the last donation, and
donors are required to return to the sperm bank for final HIV testing. To
truly qualify for fertilisation, post-thaw semen in addition needs to test for
a frozen-thaw survival threshold of 60% or above (MOH 2003). Some el-
igible donors change their minds when they discover that it can take up
to 10 months or longer to complete the entire process of having the se-
men samples declared eligible for donation. In China, each donor can on-
ly impregnate five women through AID or IVF (Gong et al. 2009). Sperm
banks are required to follow-up with treatment results and to keep rec-
ords in order to limit the number of pregnancies from the same donor. A
computer management system is used to record this data.


3. The Media Debate about Sperm Donation in Chinese
Newspapers

    This section will look at how newspapers have reported about the
controversial issue of sperm donation, and how this debate evolved dur-
ing the 2010's. This analysis will focus on archive searches of the China
Daily and Global Times. Both newspapers have news archives that are
available online. Before the news of legal proceedings broke out in early
2012, following the death of a sperm donor in Hubei Province, there was
only little news coverage of issues involving sperm banks and sperm do-
nors. An archive search of the China Daily (CD) between 2001 (when
ministerial bodies started to license and regulate human sperm banks and
assisted reproduction) and 2011 (when a sperm donor died during the
donation process) produces only sparse results. In some years, there were
none, and in other years only up to two news articles per year. Reports
during this period covered issues like the need of sperm banks for more
sperm donors (CD 2004), the difficulties that infertile couples face to find
a matching sperm donor (CD 2008), and the burdens and familial pres-
sures that childless couples face when trying to conceive (CD 2010a). By
2009, the director of Shanghai’s first sperm bank in an interview with the
CD still considered sperm donation to be a social taboo in China (CD
2009), citing cultural prejudices and a lack of knowledge as the main rea-
sons to keep potential donors away from enrolling with sperm banks.
Medical experts and government officials have always attributed the
shortage of donor applications to a ‘lack of education’ and insufficient
knowledge about sperm donation among the general population (CD
2012a), yet at the same time the media also did little during these years to
change public awareness and attitudes about the issue. Around 2010, this
situation slowly started to change. The director of Guangdong Province’s
sperm bank for instance stated to the media that the numbers of prospec-
36                                                           Tecnoscienza – 9(1)

tive donors in 2010 had gone up by almost 100%, compared to the aver-
age in previous years, when over 900 applicants attended his sperm bank
(CD 2011). According to him, the numbers started to improve, because
“more people, especially college students, have developed an interest in
donating sperm”.
    The majority of sperm donors have always been students in China. A
7-year multicentre retrospective study of sperm donation and its applica-
tion in China examined four major sperm banks between 2003 and 2009
and concluded that college students constituted by far the largest occupa-
tional group (92.7%), and that only a small percentage of donors were of-
fice workers or trade and medical professionals (less than 8%) (Ping et al.
2011). The study further found that the majority of donors were also un-
married (95.2%) and childless (99.1%). There is no science behind it, but
some like Jiangsu Province’s sperm bank in East China in Nanjing city
have altogether stopped accepting applications from working men, out of
concerns about the lesser quality of their samples (GT 2012e). For the di-
rector of Jiangsu’s sperm bank, this is a result of lifestyle, because “work-
ing males are usually under excessive pressure and many have bad habits,
including drinking, which negatively affects their sperm” (GT 2012e).
    While about 30% of the sperm donated in this sperm bank does not
meet the required standard, the rate is said to be less than 20% in sperm
samples from office or so-called white-collar workers (CD 2013c). In con-
trast, the rate of all donors (including students and all other groups) pass-
ing the examination at the Beijing Human Sperm Bank under the Nation-
al Research Institute for Family Planning was said to be about 20% in the
same year (GT 2013c).
    The gradual change in the attitudes of Chinese men to consider sperm
donation coincided with new efforts by sperm banks to increase the
number of applicants. These early recruitment campaigns aimed particu-
larly at university campuses, and news reporting began to pick this up too
(Klein 2017). Recruitment on campuses usually involved students who
were former sperm donors themselves, and their role was to distribute
leaflets among classmates and in dormitories. Newspapers informed the
public for instance that flyers were circulated on Beijing university cam-
puses with the message: “if you are over 22 years old, male, healthy, full
of love, courage and confidence, you are the right person for us” (GT
2010). It was also documented that these efforts caused a range of differ-
ent reactions among students, many of whom were still lacking
knowledge and awareness of the culturally sensitive topic. Most had never
even talked or read about sperm donation before. A common reaction
was therefore to question the purpose and methods of recruitment. One
young student for instance said to a journalist: “I saw this in the re-
strooms on our campus and even our dormitory, it’s embarrassing” (GT
2010). Hence, this form of recruitment was not always guaranteed to be
successful. A student recruiter in Shanghai who was distributing leaflets
in his dormitory for instance had not received any feedback from his fel-
Klein                                                                      37
low students, and he argued that this was due to their fear ‘to lose face’,
in that by becoming a sperm donor they would have less chances of find-
ing a girlfriend (GT 2012e). The attitudes and motivations of Chinese
men for or against sperm donation also came into focus. Against sperm
donation were voices such as: “I can't bear the thought that I might
someday meet my offspring, whom I wouldn't even know” (CD 2012a).
    There are also those for whom preserving biological kinship was not
as much a personal value, as they worried it could affect ‘others’ like their
family, friends or partners, and what would happen if they found out. A
newspaper also reported about a graduate student in Beijing who had in
fact decided to become a sperm donor, but who noted that he had kept
the donation a secret out of worry that “my family might kill me for let-
ting a stranger use the precious family seed” (CD 2010). Risk of incest
through intermarriage of ART conceived descendants from the same do-
nor has also been a recurring theme in media interviews with the public.
A man from Hubei Province for instance, who over a decade ago when he
was a student decided to become a sperm donor, told the media that “it
feels weird to know that someone you meet on the street someday could
be your child” (GT 2013b). He had decided to donate his sperm out of
altruistic reasons, but is now married with his own child and full of re-
morse that he may have other kids.
    While these cases demonstrate how sperm donation may be perceived
as a risk factor for family and social relations, others like a senior student
in Beijing also found that recruiting students to become sperm donors is a
good thing, because it “reflects progress in society” and allows students
“to make a contribution to the quality of the population in the future”
(GT 2010). However, flyers and posters as methods of information dis-
semination to reach students have not always proven to be effective, and
some sperm banks also turned to other strategies for recruitment on cam-
puses including for instance collaborations with student unions. For the
director of the Guangdong sperm bank, this turned out to work better, as
“student union members normally talk to students one-on-one in private
about sperm donation” (CD 2011). The director of Shanghai’s sperm
bank even appeared on local radio programs and gave lectures at the
city's Fudan and Tongji Universities to encourage more students to be-
come sperm donors (CD 2012a).
    The comparison of sperm donation with blood donation was another
common strategy to make the former more acceptable and to overcome
deep-rooted sociocultural concerns. In this vein, sperm bank staff explain
to potential sperm donors similar to the director in Hubei Province that
“just like blood donation, giving sperm is a humanitarian and charitable
deed” (GT 2013b). However, in as much as altruism is often presented as
the main motivational factor, there is also a monetary dimension to the
incentive to become a sperm donor. Although financial payments and the
selling of sperm are strictly prohibited for ethical reasons, monetary com-
pensation of donors for their time and expenses is permitted and ap-
38                                                            Tecnoscienza – 9(1)

proved by the provincial authorities (MOH 2003). This is also the case in
other countries including the UK10. Compensation payments are often
quite high in China compared to normal living costs and salaries, but
medical staff insist that the cash payments are not the same as incentive
payments. For instance, the director of Guangdong’s sperm bank defend-
ed this system to the media, in that it “doesn’t mean they are selling
sperm”, but that the sperm bank is “providing meals and transport fees
and compensation for loss of working time” (CD 2011).
     Donors are usually given compensation payments as the tests progress
to make sure that they return and complete the full process which can be
lengthy. Applicants usually first receive small payments to have their
blood and semen tested, and they receive greater sums for every ml of
sperm they give to the bank. When donors complete the process and re-
turn for the final HIV test six months after their last sample was frozen,
they receive an additional bonus payment. The full compensation pay-
ment in 2011 was slightly above the average monthly income in Shanghai
(CD 2011a).
    In early 2012, the death of a sperm donor in the city of Wuhan took
centre stage in the newspapers. The death of the 35-year old received
great media exposure, when the case went to court and the father sued
the sperm bank for four million Yuan (US$ 628,972) (GT 2012). Howev-
er, the district court ruled in June that the donor, who studied towards a
doctoral degree in medicine, was entirely capable of making his own deci-
sions about his life, including whether he wanted to take part in the
sperm bank program. He had signed up as a sperm donor in January
2011 and within ten days had made his fourth visit to donate sperm,
when he collapsed in the collection room. In the aftermath of the tragic
incident and the ensuing court case, news reporting about sperm dona-
tion increased significantly. For instance, a series of headlines in the
Global Times (GT) in the month of September alone read: “Sperm Banks
running empty” (GT 2012a), “Sperm bank calls for more donors” (GT
2012b), “Sperm bank offers donors a raise” (GT 2012c), and “Thank you
for coming” (GT 2012d). In January 2013, the China Daily published a
large editorial on “Banking on sperm – hope for childless couples” with a
large collection of articles on related topics, such as an institutional over-
view of different sperm banks, what is involved in the process, a frequent-
ly asked questions section about sperm donation, and public attitudes
about sperm donation (CD 2013).
    State censorship of the media with respect to sperm donation has only
been visible indirectly, when media reporting aligns with government pol-
icies. This is for instance the case when newspaper articles tend to show-
case certain motivations and attitudes over others, as the selling of sperm
is strictly forbidden in China, and donors are expected to have altruistic
motivations (despite the fact that they receive significant financial com-
pensations). Donors interviewed by the media are often quoted as being
altruistic, and motivational statements such as “I'll just be glad if I can
Klein                                                                   39
help a childless couple” (CD 2010) are quite common in the media de-
bate. However, although the media may showcase altruistic intentions
over other motivations, donors also have personal motivations and indi-
vidual experiences that make them inclined to, as Mohr (2014) puts it,
“enact their moral selves”. This is certainly the case when for instance a
34-year old civil servant in Shanxi Province described to a journalist that
he became a sperm donor when his brother became infertile - in a car ac-
cident, and the condition eventually led to his divorce (CD 2013a). The
donor firmly believed that the divorce could have been prevented, if his
brother and sister-in-law would have known more about sperm donation,
and he therefore hoped to help others in a similar situation. Yet, he also
hid his donation from his wife, because he was not sure if she would have
accepted it. In contrast, however, the newspaper also reported about a
young student in Beijing who had openly discussed his wish to become a
sperm donor with his girlfriend, who did not agree to it right away, but
who eventually convinced her “that it was a worthy cause as it would help
couples or single woman who are unable to reproduce get children” (CD
2016). Likewise, a 22-year old university student in Shanxi Province em-
phasized in an interview that it was important to him that people do not
think that he sold his sperm, even though he was given a considerable
amount of money for a student (CD 2013a). He did not want his actual
intention to be misrepresented, which was to help infertile couples.
     By 2013, public perception of sperm donation had shifted so much
that it no longer fitted easily with the old system of Confucian values of
filial duty and the patriline. There was now a more knowledgeable and
better informed (male) public with a greater openness to sperm donation,
and sperm banks significantly changed their tactics of interaction with the
male public. Social media became the new favourite platforms of recruit-
ment, and the setting up of blogs and accounts on popular Chinese web-
sites and phone applications, such as Sina Weibo11 and WeChat12, be-
came popular strategies of sperm banks to reach the young, male public.
This way, sperm banks were now able to engage more directly with large
numbers of internet users, and to provide those considering sperm dona-
tion with the opportunity to ask questions without the need to attend a
sperm bank. Hand in hand with the use of social media to promote sperm
donation, many provincial authorities also increased the level of monetary
compensation to incentivize more men to become sperm donors. The
higher compensation figures helped to draw more attention to sperm
banks, and this in turn also was picked up frequently by the press. Henan
Province’s sperm bank early in this process posted a message on Sina
Weibo, in which it offered cash payments of up to 5,000 Yuan (US$ 789)
(GT 2013a). After the notice was issued, the sperm bank reported that it
received around 50 donations per day and up to 100 during holiday peri-
ods, which was a significant increase to the number of applicants that had
attended the sperm bank before. Monetary compensation in the range of
4,000 to 5,000 Yuan (US$ 631-789) was already quite high compared to
40                                                           Tecnoscienza – 9(1)

normal living standards, but Zheijiang’s sperm bank in Hangzhou Prov-
ince even topped all other sperm banks, when it posted on its Sina Weibo
profile that it would offer a bonus of 6,000 Yuan (US$ 975) (CD 2013b).
In the UK, in contrast, where living standards, costs and salaries are much
higher, the amount is set at GBP£ 35 per visit (Human Fertilization and
Embryology Authority). The principle behind it is that the amount of-
fered is not a payment and a person should never feel compelled to do-
nate for financial gain but rather because they want to help a family in
need. The money a donor receives is to compensate for out of pocket ex-
penses. This means that after 12 weekly visits over three months, a donor
in the UK receives a total of GBP£ 420, which is far less than what a do-
nor receives in China, where living standards and average living costs are
much lower.
    This quickly led to a race among sperm banks for bolder statements
and catchier awards for donors. In 2015, Hubei Province’s sperm bank
lured new volunteers with a WeChat message beneath a photo of an iPh-
one 6s which read: “5,000 Yuan (US$ 785) will be paid for 40 ml sample
of semen (the iPhone 6s is priced at 5,288 Yuan on the mainland)” (CD
2015). The China Daily also reported that the message received 85,000
page views within two weeks and that it was a much talked about topic
among students and in online discussion forums. Trying to keep up,
Shanghai also increased its compensation level to the maximum of 6,000
yuan and posted a controversial advertisement on WeChat stating to
draw attention: “no need to sell a kidney... Shanghai sperm bank can
make your iPhone 6s dream come true” (GT 2015). ‘To sell a kidney’ is a
well-known metaphor in China that was coined when a 17- year old teen-
ager made headlines in 2011 for selling his kidney on the black market to
afford an iPhone and iPad. Within only a few days, the post had been
viewed over 100,000 times. Although it drew heavy criticism for exploit-
ing that case, the post was deemed a success, as the sperm bank was able
to increase its rate of 20 phone calls on normal working days to 200-300
calls per day to those selected from registrations on the sperm bank’s
website. Online registrations of interest and calling up potentially eligible
donors by phone have now also increasingly replaced the traditional
walk-in service. In July 2015, online donor recruitment was taken to a
new height, when seven sperm banks teamed up with the Chinese e-
commerce company Alibaba in a three-day commercial campaign that
was launched on the online shopping site ‘Taobao’. Chinese men were
promised that by signing up and completing a sperm donation they could
receive a payment between 3,000 Yuan (US$ 483) and 5,000 Yuan (CD
2015a). Within the three days that the campaign lasted more than 22,000
signed up to register with a sperm bank. The registrations were passed on
to the relevant sperm banks, some of which received equivalents to nearly
a year of walk-in traffic.
    At a time, when sperm donations just had started to pick up, the CPC
in January 2016 implemented the new ‘two-child policy’ in order to curb
Klein                                                                    41
down on population aging and to expand the pool of working-age people.
As a result of this policy change, sperm banks in Beijing, Shanghai, Shan-
xi and Hubei announced that their sperm storage was at an all-times low
(GT 2016, South China Morning Post 2016). The end of the country's
decades-old family planning policy has put new pressures on sperm
banks, as the waiting times for donor sperm have gone up even further.
Many families want to take advantage of the reforms to have a second child,
including often also older couples who are more likely to have fertility
problems. Even long before the two-child was introduced, some ART clin-
ics already had to refuse new patients “who would just end up hopelessly
waiting” (CD 2012), but the introduction of the two-child policy has made
this situation even worse. Since the introduction of the new policy, the
number of consultations in one IVF clinic in Beijing has risen by 20%
(South China Morning Post 2016). However, it is also the case that not all
families are seeking to have a second child. When the family planning poli-
cy started to relax in 2013 and allowed families to have a second child if
both parents were a single child, only about 13% of eligible married cou-
ples (1.45 million) submitted applications to the National Health and Fami-
ly Planning Commission (GT 2016). Yet, under the new nationwide policy,
the government is actively trying to convince more families to have a second
child, and in 2017 it announced to introduce new financial incentives, such
as rewards or subsidies, for families who do not want a second child due to
economic pressures (All-China Women’s Federation).


4. Conclusions

     The shortage of donor sperm has devastating consequences for infer-
tile couples seeking to undergo fertility treatment. Sperm banks have
tried in many ways to overcome the sociocultural prejudices against
sperm donation that pre-existed in Chinese society, and the paper has ar-
gued how the situation has improved in recent years. Today, sperm dona-
tion is no longer a new concept or social taboo to Chinese people, even
though recruitment of new donors is still not easy and requires a lot of ef-
fort and incentives. In interacting with a now less prejudiced (male) pub-
lic, many sperm banks have found that the use of new platforms like the
internet and social media help them to appeal to a larger number of men,
in particular the younger generation of blog and social-networking site
users that are the prime group for recruitment. However, this has also
created the risk that recruitment of sperm donors in this latest phase has
taken on a more commercial character than used to be the case. Whereas
earlier on students used to receive leaflets or went to lectures to be in-
formed about sperm donation, now the placement of promotional blog,
social network or instant messaging posts incentivizes potential donors in
ever more competitive and commercial ways, for instance by promising
the latest models of iPhones but also through forming marketing collabo-
42                                                            Tecnoscienza – 9(1)

rations with commercial companies, such as in the case of the Alibaba
campaign in 2015. As discussed earlier, the so-called compensation pay-
ments for sperm donors are significantly higher in China than the UK,
despite the fact that the costs of living are comparably much lower. Un-
like in the UK, where the compensation only covers out-of-pocket ex-
penses, in China the compensation is at a level of incentivization, even
though this is officially prohibited under the existing guidelines.
    The recruitment of sperm donors has overall increased significantly in
recent years. Evidence of this development is most visible from a retro-
spective study of China's largest sperm bank in Changsha in Hunan Prov-
ince (Huang et al. 2017). Of a total pool of 30,653 donor applicants be-
tween 2001 to 2015, 3,114 were recruited in 2001-2005, 10,386 were re-
cruited in 2006-2010, and a far greater number of 17,136 men were
screened for eligibility in 2011-2015. It is important to note that sperm
bank staff have never credited the shortage of sperm donors to cultural
prejudices alone, but also to excessive government policies. For instance,
although China has the world's largest population, it is also by far the
most restrictive country in terms of limiting the number of women that
can be impregnated by one donor to five only. In the USA, in contrast,
there is no enforced national limit, but guidelines recommend 25 births
per population of 850,000 from the same donor (The American Society
for Reproductive Medicine 2004). For the director of China's largest
sperm bank, the limitation of a single donor’s sperm to five women only is
a waste of resources and presumably the biggest hurdle for sperm banks
to meet the demand of the ART sector (CD 2010). The chances of mar-
riage between offspring from the same donor are already extremely slim
when provided to five women in a population of only three million,
whereas for a country of 1.3 billion people “one man’s sperm could safely
be provided to at least 10 women” (ibid.).
    Additional policy restrictions are that donors cannot be younger than
22 or older than 45 years old, and that they cannot be gay or foreign na-
tionals (MOH 2003). In the UK, in contrast, donors can be as young as
18 and sexuality does not matter (Human Fertilisation and Embryology
Authority). The media frequently refer to the notion that sperm count re-
quirement of 60 million spermatozoa per ml is often considered to be too
high (CD 2013), because it is three times that of the “average healthy
male”, as defined by the World Health Organization (1999). However,
normal sperm concentration ranges from 15 million to 200 million of
spermatozoa per ml of semen, whereas a count of 40 to 60 million per ml
is only average and necessary for fertilization. In fact, it has been suggest-
ed that values in the range of 50–60 million spermatozoa per ml should
be used as a lower cut-off level for full reproductive competence, whereas
the area between 15 and 40 million spermatozoa per ml delineates a grey
subfertility zone (Skakkebaek 2010). Hence, the Chinese sperm density
requirement is not too strict. It is important to note that sexually trans-
mitted diseases are also a significant cause for screening failure, but Hep-
Klein                                                                     43
atitis B, for instance, is an endemic virus in China which affects approxi-
mately 120 million individuals. Numerous applicants fail, because they
test positive for a recent or long-standing hepatitis B infection. Due to of-
ten unnecessary and counterproductive regulations, Chinese sperm banks
have to recruit that many more sperm donors, compared to American or
European sperm banks, to supply similar numbers of families.
    As these are major reasons for the chronic shortage of sperm donors
in China, medical experts hope for the government to ease some of the
restrictions and they use interviews with the media as an occasion to cre-
ate some pressure. This is an area where the government will have to
make amendments in the future, in particular that now sperm banks also
need to supply those who want to have more than one child.
    The media initially did not take on much of a role as an ‘educator’ of
the public with the aim to increase people's awareness and knowledge
about sperm donation and what it involves. Yet, a fatal incident involving
a sperm donor and ensuing legal proceedings in 2012 changed the news
cycle. The little-known topic of sperm donation and the plight of sperm
banks dealing with severe shortages of donors came more into the center
of public attention, and changed the (male) public's awareness and
knowledge about it. Sperm donation has become part of the public imag-
inary, and the debate in the media, as exemplified by two Chinese news-
papers, has contributed to this in many ways. Medical experts and gov-
ernment officials have always attributed the shortage of sperm donors to a
lack of education and knowledge about what it involves, and often told
the media that engaging the public through education campaigns is a
more effective way to ease the donor shortages (GT 2013b). The media
have played an important role. They have filled the knowledge gap that
medical experts and sperm bank staff always ascribed to be the main rea-
son for the widespread cultural prejudices against sperm donation in the
past. News reporting has also been balanced in regard to portraying the
whole range of motivations and attitudes of Chinese men with respect to
sperm donation. Thus, the news articles as ‘texts’ in the Chinese media
debate about sperm donation that contain meaning and interpretations
with the possibility of social change (Fairclough 2003) have played an im-
portant role in the dynamic relationship between sperm banks, social
events, cultural interpretations and the (male) public's perception of the
risks and benefits of being a sperm donor.


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44                                                               Tecnoscienza – 9(1)

Custer, B., Sullivan, S.D., Hazlet, T.K., da Iloeje, U., Veenstra, D.L. and
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Fairclough, N. (2003) Analyzing Discourse: Textual Analysis for Social Research,
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Gong, D., Liu, Y.L., Zheng, Z., Tian, Y.F. and Li, Z. (2009) An Overview on
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Greenhalgh, S. and Winckler, E.A. (2005) Governing China’s Population: From
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Handwerker, L. (1998) The Consequences of Modernity for Childless Women in
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Handwerker, L. (2002) The Politics of Making Modern Babies in China:
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Heng, B.C. (2009) Stringent Regulations of Oocyte Donation in China, in
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Huang, C., Baishun, L., Kongrong, X., Liu, D., Hu, J., Jang, Y., Nie, H., Fan, L.
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Klein                                                                          45
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Newspaper Article References
China Daily (CD):
CD (2004) Guangdong's sperm bank in need of more donations, 19.10.2004.
CD (2006) Health ministry tightens control on sperm banks, 10.04.2006.
CD (2006a) There’s something bigger to being a father figure, 27.10.2006.
46                                                            Tecnoscienza – 9(1)

CD (2008) Couples struggle to find usable sperm, 23.04.2008.
CD (2009) Male infertility on the rise in Shanghai, 2.04.2009.
CD (2009a) High-priced healthcare, 07.12.2009.
CD (2010) Sperm shortage breeds frustration, 15.11.2010.
CD (2010a) Heartache of Childless Couples, 21.09.2010.
CD (2011) College students ease lack of sperm donations, 21.03.2011.
CD (2011a) China’s 2011 average salaries revealed, 06.07.2011.
CD (2012) Waiting for a baby, 03.01.2012.
CD (2012a) Sperm banks reach out for donors amid supply shortage, 19.09.2012.
CD (2012b) Sperm bank expands after relocation, 10.09.2012.
CD (2013) Banking on sperm – hope for childless couples, 20.01.2013.
CD (2013a) Sperm donors recount their experience, 21.01.2013.
CD (2013b) Sperm bank offers high bonuses for donors, 07.05.2013.
CD (2013c) Quality of donated sperm is low, sperm bank says, 07.11.2013.
CD (2013d) China's largest sperm bank produces 40,000 tube babies, 21.01.2013.
CD (2015) Donate sperm to get an iPhone 6s, 17.09.2015.
CD (2015a) Alibaba promotion helps sperm banks find donors, 23.07.2015.
CD (2015b) China’s two-child policy puts pressure on sperm banks, 15.11.2015.
CD (2016) Finding the right sperm donor, 01.01.2016.
CD (2018)

Global Times (GT):
GT (2010) Students asked to make a small donation, 26.03.2010.
GT (2012) Sperm donor’s death in court, 20.06.2012.
GT (2012a) Sperm banks running empty, 06.09.2012.
GT (2012b) Sperm bank calls for more deposits, 07.09.2012.
GT (2012c) Sperm bank offers donors a raise, 09.09.2012.
GT (2012d) Thank you for coming, 17.09.2012.
GT (2012e) Higher Standards from banks and growing infertility triggers donor
   sperm drought, 28.05.2012.
GT (2013) Banking on men, 27.11.2013.
GT (2013a) Sperm bank boosts donor payments, 24.09.2013.
GT (2013b) Sperm banks struggle to attract new donors, 30.06.2013.
GT (2013c) Sperm shortage, 17.09.2013.
GT (2015) Chinese sperm banks seduce donors with promise of iPhone 6s,
   18.09.2015.
GT (2016) China’s sperm banks facing dire shortage of quality donations,
   10.05.2016.
Klein                                                                                47
Other newspapers:
Shanghai Daily (2005) Shanghai sperm bank seeking deposits, 23.08.2005.
South China Morning Post (2016) After China’s one-child policy relaxed, fertility
   clinics see rush of older parents hoping to conceive, 30.05.2016.
South China Morning Post (2016a) China's top party mouthpieces pledge
   ‘absolute loyalty’ as president makes rare visits to newsrooms, 20.02.2016.
Xinhua News (2012) Increasing infertility concerns Chinese couples, 19.12.2012.
Xinhua News (2013) China targets reproductive technology abuse, 05.02.2013.



    1
       ART’s are methods to overcome infertility through a range of different
methods, such as for instance in-vitro fertilization (IVF), fertility medication, do-
nor conception or surrogacy, although the latter is not officially permitted in China.
    2
      China’s first human sperm bank, the Xiangya Reproduction and Genetics
Hospital, was built in 1981 in central China’s Hunan Province. It is also the first
Chinese sperm bank, from where a baby was born in 1983, with the help of stored
frozen spermatozoa.
    3
      This strategy was chosen due to a lack of understanding of Mandarin. How-
ever, English-language media (ELM) are part of the news industry and Chinese
social life, and they have a history that goes back to the early 19th century (Guo
2006). ELM exist at all levels (central, provincial, and local) and cover all types of
media, such as TV, print media, radio and internet. They represent Chinese socie-
tal discourse, as they function as a window onto China for audiences abroad as
well as within mainland China.
    4
      China Daily was founded in 1981 and has the widest print circulation of any
English-language newspaper in China. The digital edition of China Daily, estab-
lished in 1995, has huge audiences around the world: daily pageviews now exceed
31 million, and nearly 50% of these views come from inside of China (China Dai-
ly, About China Daily, in http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/cd/introduction.html
(retrieved April 16, 2018). Its editorial staff is mainly Chinese. It is often used as a
guide to government policy, and its editorial policies are slightly more liberal than
those of most other Chinese newspapers. The Global Times is a daily tabloid
newspaper established under the ownership of the Chinese Communist Party’s
flagship paper, the People’s Daily. Its nationally circulated Chinese version was
founded in 1993, and since 2009 there has also been an English edition that
shares editorial content with the Chinese flagship, but to some extent it also oper-
ates independently. It has earned attention and notoriety, in both China and
abroad, as China's angriest newspaper, and has been labeled as “China’s Fox
News”.
    5
      In 2013, the Ministry of Health has been dissolved and its functions inte-
grated into a new administration, called the National Health and Family Planning
Commission.
    6
      Across the world, countries have varying laws on whether to allow anony-
mous sperm donation. In contrast to China's position, in the UK sperm and egg
donors no longer have the right to remain anonymous. Children born with the
help of a donor are able to ask for the identity of their donor when they are 18
years old (Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority).
48                                                                Tecnoscienza – 9(1)


    7
      The rule of anonymity goes back to the feeling in the past that if one adopts
a son from a non-agnate, it is best to adopt one from far away, because that way
the child will have great difficulties finding his biological parents (Wolf and
Huang 1980).
    8
       The only exception are provinces with more than 100 million inhabitants
which can have two sperm banks. For instance, Beijing has two sperm banks, one
under the National Research Institute for Family Planning at China’s Academy of
Sciences, and another one at Beijing University Third Hospital.
    9
       A large meta-analysis of 185 studies, covering nearly 43,000 men and their
sperm counts between 1973 and 2011, concluded for instance that the concentra-
tion of sperm per ml of semen among men from North America, Europe, Austral-
ia and New Zealand fell by almost 60% (Levine et al. 2017).
    10
       The commercialization of gamete donation is forbidden in many countries,
but monetary compensation is often allowed. The same system also exists in the
UK, where the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority requires that
monetary compensation to donors is reasonable so as to avoid commercializing
the procedure (Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority).
    11
       ‘Sina Weibo’ is a popular Chinese social networking site, similar to Face-
book and Twitter.
    12
       WeChat is a Chinese instant messaging application, which can be compared
to WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger.
