The implications of sperm donors carrying cancer-causing genes
The World
PRX
4.6 • 943 Ratings
🗓️ 10 December 2025
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
A sperm donor whose genetic material was used to conceive nearly 200 children in at least 14 European countries has discovered he carries a mutation that increases the risk of cancer. Also, India’s mango farmers are racing to adapt to changing markets and a changing climate. And, around 100 kidnapped Nigerian children have been returned to their families. Plus, a look at the politics behind written font types.
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| 0:00.0 | Sperm donation is big business. |
| 0:07.0 | It's a global market, patients travel, but sperm is also shipped abroad. |
| 0:13.0 | A new investigation reveals that nearly 200 children were born from one donor who had a cancer-causing genetic mutation. |
| 0:20.0 | This is really not a mutation you want your child to have. |
| 0:23.6 | Today on the world, the investigation into donor 7069. |
| 0:27.6 | Also, mass deportations in the U.S. have meant young kids are going to immigration court by themselves. |
| 0:33.6 | Frankly, I don't believe that they understand the gravity of the situation because, |
| 0:39.0 | I mean, they're just learning about what a judge is. How the legal aid system is trying to help, |
| 0:44.1 | plus fonts. It's old. I'm picturing, you know, Gutenberg, like printing his Bibles. |
| 0:50.0 | Typeface gets political. I'm Carolyn Beeler. And I'm Marco Werman. That's all ahead today on the world. |
| 0:57.5 | This is the world. I'm Carolyn Beeler. |
| 1:00.3 | And I'm Marco Wormon. We're glad you're here with us today. A story that's riveting Europe right now is about one man who donated sperm in Denmark that ended up being sold in at least 14 countries and was used to conceive |
| 1:12.1 | nearly 200 babies, maybe even more. |
| 1:14.8 | Donor 7069, it turns out, carried a genetic mutation that increases the risk of cancer. |
| 1:21.4 | Some of the children conceived with the man's sperm have already died. |
| 1:25.6 | Others are expected to develop cancer. That's according to a new investigation |
| 1:29.7 | by 14 European Public Service broadcasters. Naomi Conrad worked on this story with our partners |
| 1:36.0 | at Deutsche Bella. She says the genetic mutation has serious implications. It basically messes with a |
| 1:43.3 | gene that's called TP53 that suppresses cancerous growth. |
| 1:48.8 | So if this gene doesn't work properly, if there's mutation, it basically means that from a very |
| 1:54.7 | early age onwards, you can develop cancers. And children or young adults who have this mutation develop cancer at a very |
| 2:03.1 | early age, but it's a lifelong risk. So they develop two, three, four different kinds of |
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