Pioneer tells of early sex detection

Press, 21 April 1984, Page 12

Pioneer tells of early sex detection

NZPA-PA London The test-tube baby pioneer, Patrick Steptoe, says it will soon be possible to tell the sex of an embryo before it is put in the womb, opening the way to the elimination of sex-linked diseases. He told doctors at the British Medical Association’s scientific meeting in Cambridge: “We think it is going to be possible in the very near future to establish the sex of an embryo before replacement. “It means immediately that we can tackle sexlinked diseases and we should be able to eliminate some of the sex-linked diseases.” These include the blood disorder haemophilia, which is carried by the mother but only affects male offspring. Mr Steptoe spoke of his hopes that other genetic probes would be developed soon to tackle the causes of congenital abnormalities that now affect thousands of people.

He said embryos could also be used to test drugs to find out what effect the drug had on the foetus. The * thalidomide tragedy, he sug- ■ gested, might have been } prevented by such a technique. Mr Steptoe said his team - at the Bourn Hall test-tube ’ baby centre near Cam- . bridge had recently started ’ to freeze spare embryos. No attempt had been made to thaw them as yet. Mr Steptoe, who with Dr Robert Edwards was responsible for the birth of Louise Brown, the world’s first test-tube baby, said there was a moral obliga- ; tion to study embryos. He said members of the anti-abortion group, Life, who had criticised research on spare human embryos, should ask themselves “Don’t they wish to know about the causes of congenital abnormality?” Mr Steptoe said that since the opening of the Bourn Hall clinic, 201 test-tube babies had been bom.