Are sperm banks in Denmark rejecting donors based on their IQ?

euronews (in English)

Are sperm banks in Denmark rejecting donors based on their IQ?   An online claim that Denmark requires sperm donors to have an IQ of 85 is false, although one sperm bank in the country, Donor Network, does use an IQ threshold.  READ MORE : http://www.euronews.com/2025/12/04/are-sperm-banks-in-denmark-rejecting-donors-based-on-their-iq  Subscribe to our channel. Euronews is available on Dailymotion in 12 languages

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00:00Do Danish sperm banks reject men with too low an IQ?

00:08Are you a man with an IQ lower than 85?

00:11Well, according to a post online,

00:13Denmark would block you from donating sperm

00:16because you're not intelligent enough.

00:18The post has sparked confusion, debate and memes

00:21after claiming that Copenhagen has brought in

00:23a minimum IQ threshold of 85 to be a sperm donor.

00:27But ultimately, it's not true.

00:29What has happened is that a single sperm bank

00:32called Donor Network in the city of Aarhus

00:34has brought in the measure, prompting incorrect claims

00:37that this is the case for all Danish sperm banks to spread online.

00:41The misinformation seems to have emerged

00:43off the back of a November article

00:45by the Danish Broadcasting Corporation, or DR,

00:48which took a closer look at Donor Network and its IQ rule.

00:51The queue reached out to Donor Network,

00:53whose CEO said that he believes

00:55is the only sperm bank in the world with the requirement

00:58and that it also rejects those with a criminal record.

01:01While Denmark as a whole doesn't have

01:03an obligatory IQ requirement for sperm donors,

01:06they do have to go through a risk assessment

01:09and medical history review for any genetic risk factors.

01:12Other sperm banks have their own requirements,

01:15such as Cryos International,

01:17which says its donors must be between 18 and 45 years old,

01:20be physically and mentally healthy and live in Denmark while donating.

01:25Cryos International also rejected red-haired men as donors in 2011

01:30because it already had enough supplies.

01:32But this ban appears to have since been lifted,

01:34according to the bank's website.

01:36Many online haven't taken the alleged countrywide IQ requirement seriously,

01:41but it has still raised some ethical considerations.

01:43Broad consensus says that while traits such as a parent's IQ

01:47can influence a child's intelligence,

01:49environmental factors play a major role in shaping a child's cognitive development.

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