PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - D Hunter
AU  - S Oultram
TI  - The challenge of “sperm ships”: the need for the global regulation of medical technology
AID  - 10.1136/jme.2007.021303
DP  - 2008 Jul 01
TA  - Journal of Medical Ethics
PG  - 552--556
VI  - 34
IP  - 7
4099  - http://jme.bmj.com/content/34/7/552.short
4100  - http://jme.bmj.com/content/34/7/552.full
SO  - J Med Ethics2008 Jul 01; 34
AB  - This paper discusses the notion of using international shipping legislation to provide healthcare technologies to inhabitants of a country on a ship in international waters based just outside the country’s border. This allows technologies that would otherwise be unavailable, regulated or banned to the citizens of a particular nation to be available, just offshore. This is because in international waters ships are governed by the laws of their home nation not those they are nearby. We focus on the example suggested recently in the UK of “sperm ships”, flying Danish flags to circumvent IVF regulation in the UK. While we acknowledge that this general strategy could be used to do good by providing healthcare where it would not be otherwise available, it also provides a significant challenge to the effective sovereignty of the state and its ability to regulate healthcare technologies for the benefit of its citizens. We discuss this challenge to the regulation of healthcare and suggest a few tentative solutions.