At last week's British Association science festival, the BA president and chairman of Glaxo Wellcome, Sir Richard Sykes told us that British science is in decline. A mixture of hostility from anti-GM groups and lack of support from government have resulted in an ailing biotechnology industry. Sir Richard's address was...
Since infertility specialist Robert Winston mentioned some months ago that it may one day be possible for men to be pregnant, he quickly regretted raising a topic that promises to have a very long media gestation. Now Professor Jurgis Grudzinskas of the Royal London Hospital has made the same mistake...
The short answer is no! 'GENETIC SUPER BABIES STORM: key discovery raises spectre of designer children with high IQs' is how the Daily Mail announced the report of enhanced learning and memory in mice with over-expressed NMDA 2B receptors, the lead story in BioNews this week. A few weeks back...
Media speculation that the Department of Health proposes to recommend in forthcoming guidance to health authorities an upper age limit of 35 for women needing in vitro fertilisation (IVF) through the National Health Service (NHS) is alarming to say the least. If this is true, it fails to understand what...
Last year it was the 'good mum' gene and now we have the 'perfect husband' gene - the lead story in this week's BioNews. Like it or not, we will have to get used to the idea that genetic variation contributes to variation in behaviour and not just in mice and...
Whenever embryo screening is discussed in the media, there is always talk of slippery slopes and designer babies. And the most recent occasion should not disappoint. When Professor Joy Delhanty of University College London announced her plans to offer embryo screening - or preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) - for a range of...
This week's BioNews reports on the continuing controversy surrounding the practice known as egg sharing. In a letter to all licensed IVF clinics in the United Kingdom, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) distanced itself from egg sharing and ordered clinics to remove from their literature any reference to...
The insurance industry is in trouble again. In the field of genetics, in particular, insurers have traditionally had a reputation for putting financial gain before ethics. This week's news that insurers are using information from different genetic tests in insurance policies has been regarded by many as no great surprise...
This week's BioNews includes news from the UK that the government is planning to put an end to sperm and egg donor anonymity. The news has been greeted with a considerable amount of concern, particularly from infertility clinics and patients worried that a change in the law will mean a...
Should modern technologies be used by women who seek to conceive a child after the death of their partners? One wonders why we are witnessing all this hand-wringing, particularly since nothing has actually happened in this area. The Independent thought the issue so important that it ran a leader, as...
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