ABSTRACT
The development and availability of the new reproductive technologies have challenged traditional concepts of ‘family’ while the meaning of ‘parent’ has been unravelled into its constituent elements. The enactment in some Australian states of legislation regulating the services, and the provision of public funding for infertility treatment, indicate government recognition of the legitimacy of using reproductive technology as a means of having a child. Reproductive technologies have raised new issues of paternity, with the focus once again being on marriage rather than biology. The anonymity of donors in the new reproductive technologies raises important issues about the rights and interests of the various parties involved: the donor, the recipient couple and the child bom as a result. The inability to obtain identifying information about the donor, and the general gap between the treatment of adoption and the use of donated gametes, further obscure the infertility.
