Wednesday, August 1, 2007

Poll: Andy Lau is China women's top choice for sperm donor

01 Aug 2007, New Paper

We want to have his babies

FORGET David Beckham and Brad Pitt.

When it comes to sperm donors to have babies, Chinese woman prefer Hong Kong entertainer Andy Lau.

The 45-year-old star beat a much younger crowd of handsome faces to take the top spot in a poll conducted by Self magazine on Chinese women's most wanted sperm.

US billionaire Bill Gates came in second, while Japanese actor Takeshi Kaneshiro was third.

Beckham and Pitt were fifth and 10th respectively.

One thousand women, aged 25 to 35 and taking the poll in 15 different cities, said good looks were an important factor when choosing potential sperm donors, reported the China Daily.

Many said they chose Andy also because he has proved himself as a hardworking man.

Wealth was also a major factor, the women said. Hong Kong billionaire and Asia's richest man, Mr Li Ka-shing, was voted sixth in the poll.

CAN'T CONCEIVE

Sperm donation has become a talking point in China as nearly 10percent of the country's couples can't conceive.

Male infertility is cited as the reason for one-third of the cases, with experts blaming pollution, work-related stress and unhealthy lifestyles for the problem.

Chinese sperm banks have a hard time finding donors to meet demand.

Myths such as 'one drop of semen equals 10 drops of blood' prevented people from donating, said Mr Chen Zhenwen, director of the Beijing's only sperm bank.

There are only 10 sperm banks in the country.

Fortunately, there is a growing trend of college students coming forward to make their contribution.

Mr Chen said that college students don't share their seniors' beliefs and 'are more willing to help'.

He added that many of them are volunteers for the upcoming Olympic Games in Beijing.

Several hundred volunteers, half of them college students, have approached the sperm bank since it opened in late 2005.

Successful donors stand to get 2,000 yuan ($400), but Mr Chen said it's not always about the money.

'A college student donor even paid his airfare to complete the donation process after graduating from university,' he said.

With students now more willing to donate their sperm, experts have asked them to be wary of 'sperm hunters' on campus, who may not be authorised to handle donations.

Sperm trade outside the 88 institutions approved by China's Ministry of Health is illegal. And only these institutions can offer in-vitro fertilisation (IVF).

Professor Qiao Jie, head of the reproduction centre of Peking University Third Hospital, China's biggest fertility clinic, has also called for more careful handling of sperm donation as demand increases.


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