News and Blog - Page 3

Filter by category

05
Aug
2025

National Surrogacy Week 2025

National Surrogacy Week takes place in the UK from 1 - 7 August 2025. Its aim is to raise awareness and understanding about surrogacy. It's also a time to highlight the positive impact of surrogacy, to support open, honest and positive communication and promote ethical practices and policies for professionals and families created through surrogacy. Similarly, it is a time to celebrate the medical advancements which enable parents to create their families through fertility treatment and surrogacy and reflect on just how far surrogacy in the UK has come since the landmark ‘Baby Cotton’ case in 1985. This rise in the popularity of surrogacy also reflects the recognition of surrogacy as a mainstream family building option for prospective parents, and the willingness of the surrogates themselves to help others have much wanted children.

04
Aug
2025

World Breastfeeding Week 2025

Every year, more than one hundred and twenty countries worldwide come together to recognise World Breastfeeding Week, which this year runs from 1 - 7 August 2025. It seeks to foster an environment which uplifts and empowers women, parents and families and provides them with help and supportive environments along their parenting journey. World Breastfeeding Week is more than a celebration, it is also a time of education. Knowledge and awareness surrounding breastfeeding helps equip new parents with accurate information about nutrition, health and well-being so they can make informed decisions about their baby's development through early childhood. This information includes the understanding that breastfeeding, for all its benefits, isn’t always possible or necessary and that parents can also successfully bottle feed using formula. As such, World Breastfeeding Week is there to support everyone including those who, for reasons in or out of their control, are unable to breastfeed.

25
Jul
2025

A Cautionary Tale About Informal Sperm Donation: P v Q & F (Child: Legal Parentage) [2024]

The 2024 cases P v Q and Others [2024] EWFC and of P v Q and F (Child: Legal Parentage) [2024] 85 EWCA Civ 878 highlight a series of complex legal issues related to parenthood, parental responsibility and birth registration for lesbian families conceiving with donor sperm. It involved an intricate legal dispute about the child’s legal parentage and the circumstances of a privately arranged conception; specifically whether it took place by artificial insemination or natural conception, that reached the Court of Appeal. It brings into focus the challenges of donor conception outside of a fertility clinic and ensuing difficulties navigating legal proceedings for a Declaration of Parentage in light of entangled disputes after a relationship breakdown.

09
Jul
2025

Louisa Ghevaert: 25 Years In Law

2025 marks my 25th year in law as a qualified solicitor in England and Wales. As such, it felt important to mark the occasion since life is precious and passes by so quickly. Successful family life is a personal aspiration and central focus for many people. Families are an important pillar of society too. Yet despite this, building and maintaining happy, healthy and well-functioning personal and family lives can be difficult to achieve given the often uncertain and complex world around us. Over the last 25 years, it has therefore been an absolute privilege to draw alongside so many parents, children and families and I remain ever mindful of people’s continuing trust and faith in me to help them navigate life’s sunshine, storms and choppy waters.

09
Jul
2025

Women In Change Awards 2025

Louisa Ghevaert spent a memorable evening at Women In Change Awards 2025 in London on 3 July 2025 celebrating the transformative achievements of women from all walks of life. Women In Change is a community of female change-makers driving positive impact on a one-to-one basis, through organisations and on a global scale. This year's powerful women finalists and leaders demonstrated leadership, positive change and social impact that has helped make the world we all live in a better place. It was astounding to hear their success stories from delivering 11,000 ventilators during the Covid-19 pandemic, to saving 32 billion litres of water and counting, to changing the face of cancer care.

23
Jun
2025

Modern Families Forum 2025

On 19 June 2025, Louisa Ghevaert had the pleasure of attending Resolution's Modern Families Forum 2025 in London. Lord Justice Peter Jackson delivered an illuminating keynote address on legal parentage and the challenges this can present for families when the circumstances of a child’s conception, parentage and parental responsibility fall into dispute. This was followed by a modern family law case update and sessions which grappled with the technicalities of who has or doesn’t have parentage and parental responsibility in law. It served as a reminder that modern family and assisted conception law continues to evolve rapidly and that it can create all sorts of tricky issues when people build or restructure families and parental status and rights are disputed.

23
May
2025

DNA Testing Firm 23andMe Avoids Bankruptcy With $256m Sale: What Happens To My Genetic Data?

DNA testing firm 23andMe avoids bankruptcy with an announcement on 19 May 2025 that it will be bought by US biotechnology company Regeneron Pharmaceuticals for $256 million (approximately £192 million). Regeneron Pharmaceuticals plans to operate 23andMe and continue all consumer genome services as a wholly-owned company subsidiary. This follows news reports on 23 March 2025 that 23andMe had petitioned for bankruptcy following financial difficulties and data privacy concerns after a cyber hack in 2023 which affected personal data of 7 million users. However, this continues to raise questions for 15 million users worldwide about what will happen to their genetic information?

20
May
2025

Growing Families UK & EU Surrogacy & Donor Conception Conference 2025

On 10 May 2025 Louisa Ghevaert was pleased to attend the Growing Families UK and EU Surrogacy and Donor Conception Conference 2025, together with and an industry professional networking event on 9 May 2025 in London. This conference brought together fertility, surrogacy agency, academic and legal experts from around the world, as well as past and present intended parents building families through fertility treatment, international surrogacy and donor conception. It shone a light on current surrogacy and donor conception laws, trends and practices. It also provided insight into current medical, legal, ethical, financial and practical aspects associated with these forms of family building.

02
May
2025

Spain Cracks Down on International Surrogacy

The Spanish government has this week (1 May 2025) cracked down on international surrogacy and banned embassies and consulates from registering children born through foreign surrogacy arrangements. Whilst surrogacy is prohibited in Spain, Spanish intended parents previously got round this by entering into international surrogacy arrangements and then registering their surrogate born child abroad with the help of foreign court rulings (e.g. from the US or Canada) recognizing them as their baby's parents. Diplomats had accepted foreign court rulings and authorised the child's registration in the Spanish Civil Registry, but this has now changed following a legal ruling by Spain's Supreme Court in December 2024 which determined that this procedure was illegal.

09
Apr
2025

International Surrogacy Law Update 2025

Developments in the international surrogacy space continue to evolve rapidly. There have been multiple changes to international surrogacy law and policy in recent months. These changes have taken place in Argentina, Italy, the US and Greece. Overall, rapid developments in global politics, laws and policies make it critical for intended parents to proactively manage the associated legal issues. Prospective parents must be vigilant about the risks and ensure they have a viable legal and practical action plan before embarking upon an international surrogacy journey and consult an expert international surrogacy lawyer.

04
Apr
2025

WEALTH: Women In Health

Louisa Ghevaert was delighted to attend the launch event of WEALTH: Women In Health in partnership with Covington & Burling LLP on 2 April 2025. Its aim is to build a powerful community of women across the full value chain of health and investment to advance the health, wealth and position of women in the world. WEALTH was created because whilst women drive approximately 80% of major healthcare decisions, women are underrepresented and underserved across the industry and this needs to change. Female founders face significant barriers to innovation, with women-led startups across Europe and the U.S. receiving just 2% of venture capital funding. There is also still little funding available for female reproductive health and unconscious bias which lies deep in society in the home, workplace and at a political level which holds women back.

02
Apr
2025

Is Fertility Treatment A Solution To Population Decline?

Louisa Ghevaert was pleased to attend Progress Educational Trust's event "Is Fertility Treatment A Solution To Population Decline?" on 26 March 2025. Fertility is continuing to decline across the globe and birth rates are steadily falling. Fertility rates are now at the lowest in the UK since World War II. As such, this event looked at a range of factors influencing declining global fertility and birth rates and debated whether fertility treatment can bridge the gap and solve population decline. It also shone a light on the need for the UK to have better policies from a fertility perspective with more impact as a number of issues are not addressed in the workplace and this is affecting women's decisions to have children.

In the News

X updates

Follow Louisa on X for latest industry updates

Articles & Publications

The latest news on fertility and modern family law

News & Commentary

Louisa discusses her opinion on different topics