Daddy Issues: The case of UK man who mixed his sperm with his father’s to get wife pregnant

A man who lives in South Yorkshire’s Barnsley town, England, reportedly mixed his sperm with his father’s to help get his partner pregnant. The reason? The couple could not afford IVF treatment, as per The Guardian. The man, identified as PQ as he cannot be named for legal reasons, was taken to court by Barnsley council who demanded a paternity test. However, a High Court judge ruled that PQ would not be forced to take a paternity test. Here’s all we know about the case. Also read: Baby in a Pod: What is EctoLife, the world’s 'first artificial womb facility'? The sperm mix-up In court last month, the court heard that PQ and his partner, JK, had struggled with infertility and could not afford IVF treatment, the report said. He therefore agreed to combine his sperm with his father’s (RS), which was then injected into the woman. A boy (D), who is now five years old, was born as a result of the arrangement. Also read: ‘A Viagra for Birth Control’: How a pill that can stop sperm from swimming could revolutionise male contraception The legal action Following a separate proceeding that revealed the boy’s conception circumstances, Barnsley Council launched a legal action to determine the boy’s parentage. According to Sky News, the arrangement had been “always intended” to remain secret, Justice Poole was informed. The authorities requested that the HC in Sheffield order DNA testing to be done to establish if the man was D’s father. ‘No paternity test,’ the court rules In a ruling on Thursday, Justice Poole dismissed the petition, concluding that the council had “no stake in the outcome.” He said, “It may wish to know is D’s biological father, but it has no stake in the outcome of its application.” “A wish to uphold the public interest in maintaining accurate records of births does not confer a personal interest in the determination of such an application.” The judge concluded that the family may wish to undergo a paternity test to tell the child at a later date “but that is a matter for them.” Also read: How scientists grew the world's first 'synthetic' embryo without eggs or sperm ‘Unique child’ The judge says the family had “created a welfare minifield.” According to Sky News, the judge said that the family “had created a welfare minefield,” adding, “I cannot believe that JK, PQ, and RS properly thought through the ramifications of their scheme for JK to become pregnant, otherwise it is unlikely that they would have embarked upon it.” He said that the boy “is a unique child who would not exist but for the unusual arrangements made for his conception, but those arrangements have also created the potential for him to suffer emotional harm were he to learn of them.” Poole said the man had an established father-and-son relationship with the child, and it was up to him and the boy’s mother to “manage the latent risks to his welfare.” “It must be acknowledged that the circumstances of D’s conception cannot now be undone.” “Without testing, his biological paternity remains uncertain, but there is a strong chance, to say the least, that the person he thinks is his grandfather is his biological father, and that the person he thinks is his father is his biological half-brother.” Also read: Sperm cells have fooled scientists for centuries: They don't 'swim', they move as their tails 'spin' Cases of sperm mix-up While the latest case was a deliberate sperm mix-up, there have been cases where fertility clinics have been sued for a similar “procedural error.” Last year, a hospital in West Delhi was slapped with a Rs 1.5 crore fine in a 15-year-old case when an in-vitro fertilisation process was performed on a woman using sperm that did belong to her husband. According to India Today, the husband approached the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) after learning about the negligence. In 2022, an Ohio couple filed a lawsuit against Akron City Hospital fertility clinic and a doctor after they alleged that a sperm mix-up in 1991 resulted in their daughter not being biologically related to the man who raised her, as per CBS News. A Dutch medical institution, in 2016, launched an investigation after discovering that about 26 women’s eggs were fertilised by the wrong sperm at its IVF lab. According to The Guardian, a “procedural error” between April 2015 and November 2016 during the in-vitro fertilisation was to blame, the University Medical Centre, which is located in Utrecht, said. With inputs from agencies