Couple Offers $100,000 in Ad Seeking Woman to Donate Eggs

A pair of would-be parents have placed an ad offering $100,000 for the eggs of a bright, young, white athlete--possibly the highest offer yet made for such a service.

Their offer has raised ethical questions even for advocates of high-tech reproductive medicine, who say giving eggs should be about helping others, not making money.

The couple’s half-page advertisement, which ran this week in Stanford University’s student newspaper, specified that the woman be under 30 and an athlete “of proven college-level ability.”

The highest known price before was $50,000, offered through an ad last year in a number of Ivy League college newspapers.

“Give the gift of love and life,” the latest ad reads. “Very special egg donor needed.”

The ad was placed by Families 2000, a donor-recruiting service based in Southern California. The service did not return phone calls seeking comment Tuesday.

Fertility doctors and medical ethicists say the high offer--designed to attract a premium candidate--may actually backfire and attract a dishonest and risky donor.

“Instead of altruistic young women, it brings women interested only in money who may not be truthful about their medical history or genetics,” said Dr. Steven Katz of Fertility Associates of the Bay Area, a clinic in San Francisco.

Most donors are paid around $4,000 for the process, which entails six weeks on hormone drugs, followed by invasive surgery to harvest 12 to 15 eggs, Katz said.