You and Your Donor Egg Fetal Cells

Photo by Daquella manera

Just because you use donor eggs to conceive doesn't mean you don't have a very close biological relation with your child.

Researchers found that foreign fetal cells from donor eggs persist for years in the circulation of recipient mothers:

Dr. Zev Williams from Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston and colleagues were able to detect DSY14 Y chromosome-specific sequences in the circulation of 5 of 11 (45%) women who had donor egg pregnancies resulting in male offspring, the authors report. An earlier study reported a detection rate of 35% of women who had spontaneous male pregnancies.

The longest interval between delivery of a male offspring and detection of the circulating DSY14 sequence in Dr. Williams' patients was 9 years.

Their findings, the researchers say, "suggest the existence of an immunomodulatory mechanism that results in persistence of microchimerism with evasion of host immune surveillance."

The bad news is that now Congress can expose you for the microchimera that you are and try to ban you out of existence. The good news is that you're in good company, since women who conceive the old fashioned way are also prohibited when a chimera is defined as a human embryo that consists of cells derived from more than 1 human embryo, fetus, or born individual.