Babies following posthumous conception will not be fatherless

The Department of Health announced last Friday that it would be accepting recommendations made in a review of consent to the storage and use of human sperm and eggs. The review was conducted by Sheila McLean, professor of Law and Ethics in Medicine at the University of Glasgow and recommended that the Government allow an amendment to the 1990 Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act (HFE Act) which would enable a father's name to be registered on the birth certificate where his sperm is used by his widow after his death. Currently, a woman who has a child following fertility treatment with the sperm of her late husband has to leave the space for the father's name on the birth certificate blank, or state that the father is 'unknown'. This leaves children born following posthumous conception legally 'fatherless'.

Other recommendations made in the review report propose that the legal position on consent for the removal and use of gametes be unchanged, but that the HFEA should have the power to allow the storage of gametes where there is no consent, so long as the gametes have been lawfully removed. This would be the case where doctors decide that it is in a patient's best interests to have their gametes preserved. It is thought that such a provision will benefit children and those incapable of giving consent who might undergo medical treatments that affect their fertility.

Although not considered by the McLean review, the Government has also decided that the changes to the registration of births can operate retrospectively. Women who have had children following posthumous conception will be able to apply for the birth to be re-registered, and to receive a new birth certificate that shows the details of the father, followed by the word 'deceased'. Rights of succession and inheritance will remain unchanged, meaning that a child conceived from the frozen sperm of a dead man will not have legal rights to their father's estate.

The Department of Health announcement has not been welcomed by some pro-life groups. A spokesman for Life said 'there's more to fathering than use of one sperm. When a father is dead, he is not there to perform his fatherly duties and we believe that the most important thing is the psychological bond between father and child'.

Diane Blood, one of the women who have been campaigning for changes to the law, said of the government's proposals that 'it is very important for these children and their mothers because it means that the biological facts will be recorded as they truly are'.