Gov. Jared Polis has signed a bill barring state and local governments from limiting physicians’ ability to providing certain reproductive health services, including in-vitro fertilization. 

House Bill 1259, sponsored by Reps. Meg Froelich, D-Englewood, and Kyle Brown, D-Louisville, and Sens. Lisa Cutter, D-Littleton, and Lindsey Daugherty, D-Arvada, also requires sperm and egg donors to inform donor banks of any significant medical history updates. Donor banks will be required to notify donation recipients of any such updates.

The bill also “encourages” donor banks to inform individuals conceived using donor gametes about the “physical and emotional risk” associated with finding out the identity of their donor.

In 2022, Colorado became the first state in the country to pass legislation eliminating anonymous sperm and egg donations. The law’s provisions went into effect on Jan. 1 and required donors to agree to have their identity released to children conceived from their donations once they turn 18. The bill also increased the minimum age of donors to 21, limited them to contributing to no more than 25 families, and gave families access to donor’s updated medical records.

“I am proud to live and raise my family in Colorado, a state that is recognized around the country and world for its world-class reproductive healthcare system,” said Kristina Shaw, chair of Colorado Fertility Advocates, upon the passage of HB 1259. “As threats to reproductive health care mount across the country, this bill takes critically important steps to ensure our state remains a reproductive health refuge, where people of all races, genders, sexual orientations, or income levels have the opportunity to build a family like I did.”

Sponsors of HB 1259 say the helps eliminate some of the barriers introduced by the 2022 law that contributed to a significant decline in gamete donations in Colorado.  

The drop in donations nationwide is likely due in part to a 2024 Alabama Supreme Court ruling which found embryos created through IVF should be considered children under the state’s Wrongful Death of a Minor Act. 

According to HB 1259’s legislative declaration, fertility clinics in the state stopped providing IVF services due to concerns about prosecution should an embryo be accidentally destroyed. Even though the ruling only applies to Alabama, it has negatively impacted people seeking fertility treatments across the country, including in Colorado, sponsors say.  

“Colorado has been recognized for decades as a medical destination for those seeking sophisticated and cutting-edge medical care for infertility,” the declaration states. “Colorado’s fertility clinics are highly respected; the state’s medical practitioners are known as pioneers in assisted reproductive technologies, or ART medical care; and Colorado continues to advance and provide top-notch ART fertility care.

The declaration also states that it is important to keep the transparency and rules around donor disclosure in order to address the concerns of individuals conceived through donors while preserving Colorado’s “world-class” assisted reproduction technologies, infertility care options, and gamete donation medical environment. 

The bill passed on a 40-23 vote in the House, with all Republicans and one Democrat, House Speaker Julie McCluskie of Dillon, voting in opposition. It passed on a 28-7 vote in the Senate.