Family Law & Fertility Law Blog | Louisa Ghevaert Associates

Secret Sperm Donation & The Early Years of UK IVF

An article in The Telegraph (1) on 20 December 2024 has reported concerns by two individuals about early UK fertility clinic practices, having recently discovered that they share the same secret sperm donor; a scientist in charge of the laboratory in the 1970's on the floor above UK IVF pioneer Patrick Steptoe's clinic at Oldham Hospital. Fifty years on, this has come to light after both individuals registered for DNA tests on Ancestry.com, reportedly raising concerns about whether their mothers were unknowingly impregnated without their consent with donor sperm.

The Future of Womb Transplants

On 20 November 2024, Louisa Ghevaert attended a Progress Educational Trust event "10 Years of Womb Transplants: What Have We learned? What Does the Future Hold?". This fascinating event looked at the important and pioneering uterine transplant work that has been undertaken over the last 10 years, starting with the world's first successful human womb transplant and live birth in September 2014. Since then, there have been more than 135 uterus transplants around the world, including news of the UK's first womb transplant in 2023. In doing so, uterus transplants offer hope and greater reproductive choice for women whilst raising complex medical, legal and ethical issues.

Newborn Genome Sequencing At Birth: The Generation Study Progress Update

Louisa was pleased to attend Progress Educational Trust's event "Whole Genome Sequencing at Birth: Implementing The Generation Study" on 23 October 2024. This event provided a progress update on The Generation Study, which is an NHS embedded research study undertaking whole genome sequencing of 100,000 newborn babies at different hospitals across England. The Generation Study's aim is to better inform future decisions about using whole genome sequencing to support newborn screening and understand whether this can improve our ability to diagnose and accelerate access to treatment for rare genetic conditions.

BBC News: DNA Testing and the Law, ‘I could have lost my child’ after flawed DNA test

Louisa Ghevaert was interviewed on 8 BBC Radio Stations on 23 October 2024 discussing issues and legalities associated with prenatal DNA testing and other forms of DNA testing. This followed news of a woman who received flawed DNA test results identifying the wrong man as her unborn baby's father, resulting in a lengthy legal dispute over custody of her child. The woman was reportedly one of dozens of women who received unreliable DNA test results from a Canadian laboratory which advertised online.

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