A Co Down couple are expecting Ireland's first "designer" baby, conceived to provide stem cells to treat their two-year-old son, who has a rare blood disorder.
Julie and Joe Fletcher, from Moira, Co Down, underwent IVF treatment at a London clinic to produce an embryo whose tissue type would be an exact match for two-year-old Joshua.
The boy suffers from Diamond Blackfan Anaemia (DBA), and has to endure 12-hour injections of steroids into his stomach five times a week and blood transfusions every three weeks. A stem-cell transplant could cure him. Without it he could be dead by the age of 30.
The Fletchers are the first in the UK to make use of a change in the regulations banning the creation of children specifically to act as stem-cell donors. In July, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) sparked a major ethical debate when it agreed to overturn the ban. Groups opposed to the procedure argued that allowing parents to choose embryos, even for the purpose of saving a sick child, could eventually lead to designer babies on demand.
The Fletchers' doctor, Dr Mohammed Taranissi from the Assisted Reproduction and Gynaecology Centre, London, claimed yesterday the term "designer baby" was misleading as no embryos were being designed.
"The embryos develop at random in the laboratory. What we do is test them for certain potential characteristics and then use them to help people who are seriously ill," he said.
Some weeks ago the Fletchers visited his clinic for pre-implantation genetic diagnosis tests, where single cells were taken from fertilised eggs to check for a perfect match. When one embryo matched this criterion, it was implanted in Ms Fletcher.
When her baby is born, stem cells will be taken from the umbilical cord before it is discarded and the newborn child will be expected to grow up as normal.
"You can actually take the cord bloods and use what is called stem cells from within the cord bloods and transfuse them into the affected child ... that's all that is required for the cure. The chances of this being successful is in the order of about 80 to 85 per cent so that's a very good chance of success," Dr Taranissi said.
He emphasised, however, that it was "very, very early days".