IVF twins born with 'five parents'

A set of twins born following fertility treatments in the UK have been described as having 'five parents'. According to newspaper reports, they are the first ever children to have this many parents, 'one of whom is also their grandmother'. The journal Reproductive BioMedicine Online, where the case is reported, says they are the first children to be born in the UK using embryo donation in conjunction with 'intergenerational mother-daughter surrogacy'.

The newspaper reports say that the twins, who were born three years ago, have 'three mothers and two fathers'. The couple, who are now the legal parents of the twins, needed fertility treatment, as the woman had been left infertile by radiotherapy and chemotherapy used to treat a childhood cancer. At first, the couple tried IVF using the man's sperm and donated eggs. After four failed cycles, the woman's 44-year old mother offered to act as a surrogate to carry an embryo created from the man's sperm and a donor egg. By this time, however, no donor eggs were available, so the couple opted to use donated embryos instead.

The surrogacy arrangement worked successfully, but it has taken three years since the birth of the children for the High Court to decide their legal status. The couple were not eligible to apply for a 'Parental Order' under the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990, which legally transfers parentage after a surrogacy arrangement, as neither of them are genetically related to the children. The couple have only recently been granted an adoption order.

Brian Woodward, the embryologist who treated the couple at the Middle England Fertility Centre in Leicester, said that the twins were the result of 'a very unusual arrangement', adding that 'we went through all sorts of ethical hoops, but it was clear it was the right thing to do'. But a spokesperson for the pressure group Comment on Reproductive Ethics said 'we are looking at the total disintegration of social and family values'.