Frozen embryo baby born

Press, 12 April 1984, Page 1

Frozen embryo baby born

NZPA-AAP Melbourne The development of the freeze-thaw embryo technique raised new ethical issues, said the head of Melbourne’s in-vitro fertilisation team, Professor Carl Wood, yesterday, after the announcement of the birth of what is believed to be the first baby produced from a frozen embryo. I.V.F. research had developed faster than the law could keep pace, he said. He told a news conference that the embryo baby, Zoe, a healthy 2.5 kg at birth, was delivered two weeks ago by Caesarean section at Monash University’s Queen Victoria Medical Centre, Epworth Hospital.

Zoe’s mother is a kindergarten teacher, aged 34, born in New Zealand, and the father an Englishman, aged 35.

Professor Wood said the birth using the frozenthawed embryo represented “the most important moment” in the I.V.F. programme so far.

Professor Wood said that both the mother and baby were now well and the baby was breast-feeding. The parents, who had been married 12 years, had a seven-year history of infertility resulting from the woman’s diseased fallopian tubes.

Before joining the in-vitro programme, the mother had had two unsuccessful operations, including microsurgery, to remedy the tube blockage. “During the woman’s first treatment with 1.V.F., doctors collected 11 ovocytes (eggs). Ten were fertilised in-vitro and two days later three embryos were transferred to her uterus.

“No pregnancy resulted from this attempt,” Professor Wood said.

Of the remaining seven embryos, six developed normally and were frozen in liquid nitrogen the next day, three days after fertilisation.

Two months later, the woman returned for a second attempt at pregnancy and the three embryos which survived the freeze-thaw were transferred to her uterus. One embryo was successfully implanted in the uterus lining and a pregnancy developed.

Professor Wood said the first few weeks of the pregnancy were complicated by hormone deficiency and an ovarian cyst. After treatment, the pregnancy developed normally for 36 weeks when foetal growth retardation with evidence of reduced placental function was diagnosed.

An emergency Caesarean section was performed which resulted in the premature delivery of the baby.

Professor Wood said that two more patients had received freeze-thaw embryo implants. He said the freeze-thaw technique had important implications for human reproduction. The technique would improve the efficiency of I.V.F. by reducing the risk of multiple pregnancies and the need for repeated surgery to collect eggs. It would enable better matching between donor and recipient, and should

result in fewer gynaecological problems. Professor Wood said the Waller Committee, which is considering a range of issues in relation to frozen embryos and surrogate mothers, would have to make a decision on what should happen to embryos which were not required. Another issue to be considered was whether couples had the right to dispose of embryos or if they could be made available for research.

The Monash team had frozen 230 embryos and 40 had been subsequently thawed. The remaining 190 were still in storage. Of the 40 embryos thawed, 23 survived and were transferred.

The Victorian president of Right To Life, Ms Margaret Tighe, said yesterday that people “should look beyond the obvious pleasure of a Victorian couple at the birth of their frozen embryo baby and face the implication of accepting freezing of live human beings as a legitimate technique. “Let us not forget that each and every embryo is a member of the human family — a child of the couple involved.

“It is considered a gross breach of human rights to subject human beings to experimentation without their consent, yet this is what is happening too these hapless embryos,” she said.