Lack of space and resources is being blamed for the accidental destruction by a Bristol fertility clinic of sperm samples belonging to cancer patients.
Samples belonging to 28 cancer patients at Southmead Hospital are believed to have thawed out because of a fault in a storage freezer.
The men are undergoing treatment which is likely to make them infertile.
The Human Embryology and Fertilisation Authority says the hospital should have made sure samples were split and stored in two separate freezers.
Freezer costs
But the North Bristol NHS Trust which runs the hospital claims there were not enough resources to do this.
A spokesperson for the Human Embryology and Fertilisation Authority told BBC News Online: "It is good medical practice and a recommendation to split sperm samples in storage.
"Hospitals usually abide by the Association of Clinical Embryologists' (ACE) recommendations to do this."
ACE said the cost of a freezer in this kind of case ranges from £1,000 to £13,000, not including maintenance costs.
Southmead and Frenchay hospitals - run by the North Bristol Trust - have debts of £44.3m after overspending in the last year.
An internal inquiry has been promised into the loss of the sperm.
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