Satoko Nagamura and her friend fathered their son using donated sperm, but new laws in Japan could effectively ban the process for lesbian couples and single women.

For decades, anonymous sperm donation in Japan has existed in a legal gray area, with no law specifically prohibiting it, nor any framework that governs it.

Laws, expected to be introduced this year, would regulate the process, including protecting children’s rights to know their birth parents and limiting recipients from a single donor.

However, a draft submitted to AFP shows the law would allow the process only for legally married couples, mainly those affected by male infertility. Japan does not recognize same-sex marriage, so lesbian couples and single women would be excluded.

For Nagamura, the draft “is tantamount to depriving women—whether same-sex couples or single people—of their reproductive rights and their desire to bear and raise children.”

For nearly two decades, the 39-year-old dreamed of being a mother and “giving birth with my body.”

She and her partner Mamiko Moda, 42, first considered foreign sperm banks before reaching out to a male friend, encouraged by his willingness to embark on a relationship with the child-to-be.

They are now the proud parents of a 10-month-old son, who smiles freely as his parents feed him encouraging cries of “well done” while the family’s two dogs look on jealously.

Institutions offering sperm donation and insemination generally follow the guidelines of the Japan Society of Obstetrics and Gynecology (JSOG), which serve as the basis for new legislation restricting the procedure to married couples.

The JSOG’s guidelines are non-binding, but already carry so much weight that only a handful of doctors are defying them to do justice to lesbians and single women.

If the law goes into effect, “the few hospitals that accepted us will no longer be able to do so,” Nagamura said.

“There’s a big difference between just breaking the policy and doing something illegal,” Moda added.

The couple also fear the new legislation could mean their child, who was conceived through artificial insemination using a sperm donor, could be stigmatized.

“Even though the way we achieved our pregnancy wasn’t illegal at the time, it could give the impression that we did something wrong, that this child is somehow ‘illegal’ if the law says so,” he said style

Kozo Akino, a ruling coalition lawmaker who helped draft the law, argues that children’s rights are most easily protected by “legally married parents with joint custody.”

“Assisted reproductive technology should not be pursued at the expense of children’s well-being,” he told AFP.

And some doctors say the law could help make the unregulated treatment more socially acceptable, though it’s limited to heterosexual couples.

“I hope that our treatment with the law will be seen as more legitimate and become mainstream,” said Mamoru Tanaka, a professor of obstetrics at Keio University Hospital in Tokyo.

It is believed that Keio was the first medical facility in Japan to perform donor insemination in 1948, but it is no longer accepting new patients due to a donor shortage that followed an internal policy change.

Since 2017, it has warned donors that legal action could be taken against children conceived from their semen database that their anonymity could be stripped away. Due to the resulting shortage of applicants, only 481 procedures were performed for existing patients in 2019, compared to 1,952 in 2016.

Patients would “hopefully be able to benefit from[a legal framework]but that’s easier said than done,” Tanaka said.

“There is a possibility that more people will be pushed underground and in that sense it’s a double-edged sword,” he told AFP.

Some women and couples are already turning to unverified sperm donors to circumvent the complexity and limitations of the existing system.

A cursory Twitter search turns up hundreds of accounts touting the looks, college degrees, and athletic prowess of potential donors, who typically offer recipients seed cups for either self-fertilization or fertilization through sexual intercourse.

Many don’t expect payment beyond transportation costs, which has helped fuel debate about their motives, including claims they’re just after sex.

A man who is promoting his services online told AFP he considers it a blood donation.

“I happen to have a healthy body, so why not put it to good use?” said the 34-year-old freelance illustrator, declining to be named.

The man’s wife, a 32-year-old doctor, told AFP she supports her husband’s donations partly because, as a bisexual person, she wants to help others in the LGBTQ community conceive.

But sperm donation on social media raises health and safety issues related to donor profile verification.

And Nagamura worries that these riskier donations will only become more common if legislation excludes single women and lesbians.

“There will be those who will do anything to have children,” she said.

“It’s not that easy to give up childbirth.”