ARTIFICIAL-INSEMINATION BY DONOR - AN ALTERNATIVE FOR SINGLE WOMEN

Artificial insemination using donor spermatozoa (ALD) has been known a s a treatment for heterosexual couples where the husband has been foun d to be infertile. The first woman without a male partner wanting a ch ild by AID was admitted to the fertility centre in 1981, In the litera ture, two categories of alternative requests, i.e. those from lesbian couples and those from single women, are treated as equivalent family structures since both lack a father figure. However, single women shou lder the responsibility for the child's upbringing alone, whereas in l esbian couples partners share this responsibility, Some of the objecti ons raised to alternative types of parenthood therefore refer more to women not having a partner at all, Since 1981, 94 single women have as ked the Fertility Centre of the Free University of Brussels to be cons idered for AID treatment. Data from this group of alternative requests have been collected, The aim is to draw up a profile of the single wo men who request AID, and to make a distinction between applicants who were accepted and those who were refused.