University of California has almost settled fertility scandal lawsuits

The University of California has settled 107 of the 113 lawsuits resulting from the fertility clinic scandal that rocked the medical centre in 1995. Regents of the university have so far agreed to pay nearly $20m to 107 infertile couples, including those who had their eggs stolen. The remaining six cases could be settled by the autumn. The egg scandal, when two UC Irvine clinicians lost or pirated eggs and embryos from numbers of couples who went to one of the clinics for treatment, remains a landmark case in the breach of medical ethics. In some instances, eggs or embryos were given secretly to other patients or used in research. Some couples bore children conceived using the eggs of other women without the consent of the genetic parents. Although at the time legal experts were predicting huge jury awards against the doctors, the university and a private hospital where the doctors did some of their work, none of the cases went to trial. The two main clinicians in the case, both indicted, have left the country.