A team of doctors from Greece and Spain announced the birth of a healthy baby boy who was conceived via an experimental form of in vitro fertilization (IVF). DNA from the egg of one woman was put into the egg of a donor woman, and then fertilized using the father’s sperm. The procedure, known as maternal spindle transfer, is one of three types of mitochondrial replacement therapy (MRT).
The boy was born in Athens, Greece Tuesday weighing 6 pounds. Both the child and the 32-year-old mother are in good health, the doctors said in a statement.
A Spanish company called Embryotools announced the pregnancy in January following the first known trial of the procedure. The study enrolled 25 women under 40 who had been diagnosed with "infertility problems due to poor egg quality,” and who had at least two previous failed IVF attempts. Since the technique wasn’t approved in Spain, the company collaborated with a fertility clinic in Athens called the Institute of Life.
Dr. Panagiotis Psathas, president of the Institute of Life, celebrated the milestone.
By Anumita Kaur [cites CGS’ Katie Hasson], The Washington Post | 03.25.2025
Aggregated News
Genetic information company 23andMe has said that it is headed to bankruptcy court, raising questions for what happens to the DNA shared by millions of people with the company via saliva test kits.
By Peter Wehling, Tino Plümecke, and Isabelle Bartram | 03.26.2025
Biopolitical Times
This article was originally published as “Soziogenomik und polygene Scores” in issue 272 (February 2025) of the German-language journal Gen-ethischer Informationsdienst (GID); translated by the authors.
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