Aggregated News
China is looking for quality sperm. Ever since the nation loosened its one-child family-planning policy earlier this year, its sperm banks have reported serious shortages as couples look for ways to expand their families. Infertility stalks up to 15% of Chinese couples, according to Jiang Hui, the director of andrology at Peking University Third Hospital in the Chinese capital, Beijing, which officially unveiled a new sperm bank in August.
“We still don’t have enough donors,” he says, noting that there are only 23 legal sperm banks nationwide, with another 20 under construction — all at public hospitals. “Most families who come to us [for sperm] have to wait at least a year.”
The semen-collection room at Peking University Third Hospital is geared toward utility. There’s a portrait of a minimally clothed Western woman, a well-thumbed pornography magazine, a sofa, a sink, a box of tissues and some liquid soap. An emergency button is affixed to the wall. Each day, around 20 donors file in but only 19% of volunteers qualify for the program. Donors must be junior-college-educated men between the...