"Children of three parents": the discussion is coming to an end
In the UK, the final discussion of "IVF from three parents" has begun
These consultations will be the final before the expected legalization of this assisted reproductive technology in the UK at the end of 2014, which will make it the first country in the world to take such a step.
The experimental method developed in laboratories in the UK and the USA is designed to help families with mitochondrial diseases (diseases associated with defects in the DNA of mitochondria transmitted only through the maternal line) to have healthy children. It consists in removing defective mitochondrial DNA from the mother's egg during in vitro fertilization and transferring the fertilized nucleus to a nuclear-free egg of a donor woman, which provides the future organism with its healthy mitochondria, whose function is to provide the cell with energy. Thus, a genetically modified embryo is obtained, endowed with genes from three parents: mother, father and a female egg donor. Currently, two techniques have been developed for conducting three–parent IVF - the transfer of the maternal spindle of division (maternal spindle transfer, MST) and the transfer of the nucleus (pronuclear transfer, PNT).
Approximately one in five thousand women are carriers of defective mitochondrial DNA, which can cause incurable heart diseases, liver failure, brain development disorders, blindness, diabetes and muscular dystrophy in a child. In the UK, about 200 children with mitochondrial diseases are born every year.
It is planned that the British Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority (HFEA) will make a separate decision on each case of the use of the three-parent IVF method, determining the degree of risk of mitochondrial diseases in offspring. It is expected that permits to use the method will be issued only in the most serious cases and will not exceed ten per year.
Public consultations on the experimental method have been ongoing in the UK since September 2012. In March 2013, the HFEA, based on their results, which showed a high level of support for this controversial procedure in various segments of British society, recommended that the government allow it to be carried out in the country. In June 2013, it was reported that the British government plans to prepare a bill on the legalization of "IVF from three parents" in the autumn of the same year. Nevertheless, there is a continuing debate in British society about the ethical side of the procedure. In addition, doubts remain about her safety.
The Ministry of Health of the United Kingdom announced on February 27 that it hopes to collect as many opinions as possible by the end of May on the preliminary regulations it has developed for the use of the method in order to then submit its final version to Parliament for approval.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru04.03.2014