Since 1991, sperm donors in the UK have had the legal right to withdraw consent for the use of their sperm in fertility treatment. This has the potential to adversely affect patients. It may mean that previous recipients of a donor’s sperm cannot have further children who are full biological siblings to an existing child, and that embryos created from the donor’s sperm and a patient’s eggs must be destroyed. We have informally investigated withdrawal of consent by sperm donors donating after 1 April 2005, when lifelong anonymity for gamete donors ended.
The first British baby genetically-selected to be free of a breast cancer gene has been born. She grew from an embryo screened to ensure it did not contain the faulty BRCA 1 gene, which passes the risk of breast cancer down generations.
Coalition government promises to abolish respected regulator in effort to cut back on quangos. In the ethically fraught field of human-embryo research, Britain's Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) has long been regarded as a world leader in regulating and advising scientists. But now the HFEA faces the axe, and researchers and politicians are chorusing their discontent. "I'm absolutely astonished at this," says Ruth Deech, an independent member of the House of Lords and former chair of the HFEA. "I think our standing in the world will be reduced."
The new parenthood provisions set out in Part 2 of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008 have been attacked as dangerous and radical, offering a 'lego-kit model of family life' and a 'magical mystery tour' in how legal fatherhood is to be determined. In this paper, we explain what is innovative about these new provisions but also explore what they owe to deep-rooted traditional assumptions about the family. Relying both on published documentation relating to this reform process and a small number of key actor interviews, we trace the imprint of what Fineman has described as the 'sexual family' model on the provisions. We conclude that the way that parenthood is framed within the legislation relies on a number of important normative assumptions which received very little scrutiny in this process. We also highlight a number of tensions within this framing which, we suggest, may create future problems for judicial determination.
These proceedings involve separate but linked applications by two men for leave to apply for orders under s.8 of the Children Act 1989. In each case, the application concerns a child conceived using sperm provided by the man and born to a woman in a civil partnership. As a result of the reforms introduced in the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008, legal parenthood of the children is vested in the mothers and their respective civil partners to the exclusion of the biological fathers who therefore have no right to apply for orders in respect of the children without the leave of the court. I am told that these two cases are the first to come before the court involving an application for leave to apply for s.8 orders from men who, having provided sperm for couples in a civil partnership, are by virtue of the 2008 Act not the legal fathers of the children thereby conceived. It is argued by counsel appearing before me that the outcome of this case has significant public policy...
Pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) is a technique that enables people with a specific inherited condition in their family to avoid passing it on to their children. It involves checking the genes of embryos created through IVF for this genetic condition. Before PGD clinics are permitted to test for a condition or combination of conditions, the HFEA must first agree that the condition they want to test for is sufficiently serious. This list of conditions are those that the HFEA has so far agreed that it is acceptable for clinics to use PGD to test for.
A longstanding ban on selling sperm and eggs should be reconsidered to address a national shortage of donors, the head of the Government’s fertility watchdog says. Payments to donors could cut the number of childless couples travelling abroad for treatment, Lisa Jardine, of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, told The Times.
The article in the Sunday Times last week ‘Embryos destroyed for minor disorders’ was inaccurate and misleading and could cause confusion and distress for those families undergoing or considering IVF treatment with pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD). PGD is licensed only for serious medical conditions which severely threaten the future health and wellbeing of children. It is not a ‘routine’ procedure. In 2007, out of nearly 37,000 patients who received fertility treatment, 169 had PGD, fewer than one in 200. Embryos are tested when they are just three days old and made up of about eight cells. They are not at the developed stage of the foetus as shown in the photograph.Finally, to suggest that embryos are destroyed for ‘minor conditions’ which would require ‘unpleasant treatment’ is not only misleading, it is disrespectful both to those living with the condition, and those seeking to avoid passing on these serious conditions to their children.
A LESBIAN couple have won the right to IVF on the NHS after a legal tussle, ahead of laws that will put same-sex patients on an equal footing with heterosexuals. The couple, who remain anonymous, had to go through a legal fight to push the NHS to fund IVF because, at the moment, individual trusts decide whether they wish to pay for treatment for lesbians. The couple were initially refused IVF by their primary care trust because they were of the same sex. One of the women had polycystic ovarian syndrome, which disrupts ovulation, and is one of the most common causes of infertility. From October, clinics will no longer be able to block lesbians by referring to a child’s “need for a father”. Instead, same-sex couples will need to demonstrate only that they can offer “supportive parenting”.