Fertility News Links

Head teachers are urging the government to take immediate action after a legal drug was linked to the deaths of two teenagers. And nearly 30,000 hospital beds in England should be axed to save money and improve care, a think tank says. 17 March 2010, 7:30 am

There is no evidence acupuncture or Chinese herbal medicine boost the chance of IVF success, fertility experts warn. 10 March 2010, 12:17 am

Lauren Roberts is only 23, but fears she might never become a mother. 27 February 2010, 12:01 am

A mother has given birth to a second child after a pioneering ovarian transplant operation. 24 February 2010, 4:48 pm

Reproductive techniques: Your comments on this weeks scrubbing up 10 February 2010, 11:32 am

Science offers many hopes to would-be families anxious to start a family. But in this week's Scrubbing Up, a leading expert warns age is still the critical factor in achieving that dream. 10 February 2010, 12:04 am

I thought I was past the point in life where I would fall pregnant naturally" 9 February 2010, 6:00 pm

A mechanism which starts sperm swimming near the egg could lead to new forms of male contraception, say scientists. 5 February 2010, 12:08 am

A 59-year-old plans to have a baby through IVF and dissenting voices can be heard everywhere from the newspapers to the office watercooler. But is there really any reason why we should have a problem with the idea, asks medical ethicist Daniel Sokol. 26 January 2010, 11:55 am

The UN declaration that it has never faced a crisis on the scale found in Haiti following Tuesday's earthquake dominates Sunday's papers. 17 January 2010, 6:55 am

Have you had an IVF baby in the last 4 years? 12 January 2010, 12:14 pm

A woman has given birth to twins after she had fertility treatment using the frozen sperm of her late husband after he died of cancer. 8 January 2010, 12:26 pm

A guide to Scottish Labour's front bench spokesmen and women in the Scottish Parliament. 31 December 2009, 1:01 pm

A liberalisation of the rules regulating fertility clinic in Denmark has seen people travelling long distance for treatment in the country. 23 December 2009, 12:35 pm

An embryo screening test called preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD)is safe for the children of singleton pregnancies, Belgian researchers say. 21 December 2009, 1:59 pm

The Supreme Court in the Republic of Ireland dismisses an appeal by a woman to have three of her frozen embryos released to her. 15 December 2009, 1:19 pm

A tutor is jailed for indecently assaulting a girl as she read the Koran to him at her Leicestershire home in the 70s and 80s. 10 December 2009, 4:48 pm

The fertility watchdog is to discuss more generous compensation to egg and sperm donors as a means of tackling the severe shortage of supplies for those desperate for a baby. 9 December 2009, 5:50 pm

A look at what's making the headline in Friday's morning newspapers. 20 November 2009, 9:11 am

A conference at Queen's University in Belfast is to discuss the growing problem of male infertility. 19 November 2009, 8:55 am

President of the European Council Herman Van Rompuy explains his love for haiku, the tiny Japanese verse form. 20 March 2010, 12:27 pm

A coastguard tug boat takes a cargo ship under tow after it got into difficulties in heavy seas about 40 miles off Orkney. 19 March 2010, 4:17 pm

US researchers using genetically engineered fruit flies with glowing sperm track the seed's progress inside the female in real time. 19 March 2010, 1:40 am

No sooner is one legal high banned than another appears. The latest facing calls for a bar is mephedrone, or m-cat. It's part of a war of attrition between dealers and the authorities. So how does it all work? 18 March 2010, 1:22 pm

The parents of a teenager who died after taking the legal drug mephedrone urge the government to make it illegal. 17 March 2010, 5:10 pm

The government says it will "take any action" needed over the legal drug mephedrone after the deaths of two teenagers. 17 March 2010, 4:47 pm

Key facts, figures and dates 17 March 2010, 10:43 am

Head teachers say a ban on the legal drug mephedrone should be considered following the deaths of two teenagers. 17 March 2010, 9:40 am

Head teachers are urging the government to take immediate action after a legal drug was linked to the deaths of two teenagers. And nearly 30,000 hospital beds in England should be axed to save money and improve care, a think tank says. 17 March 2010, 7:30 am

The BBC's Soutik Biswas on how India's most socially developed state, Kerala, is also its most economically backward. 17 March 2010, 12:21 am

The Taiwanese authorities offer a cash prize for a new slogan to boost the island's falling birth rate. 16 March 2010, 12:28 pm

Spreading iron in the oceans as a climate "fix" could poison marine mammals and birds, scientists show. 16 March 2010, 3:04 am

Sports players and fans in Manchester are targeted in a campaign to boost the number of sperm donors. 16 March 2010, 12:37 am

A new law in Turkey makes it a criminal offence for a woman to go abroad and get pregnant via artificial insemination. 15 March 2010, 6:10 pm

BBC Scotland takes a look at the history of guerrilla gardening. 15 March 2010, 11:56 am

A number of residents forced to leave their homes because of a suspicious fire at a farm in Garvagh are allowed to return. 13 March 2010, 2:47 pm

The BBC's Caroline Duffield reports on the continued tension between rival communities in the Nigerian city of Jos after the recent slaughter of at least 100 people. 12 March 2010, 5:30 pm

The Big Bang exhibition proved to be a fertile ground for young news hounds in the Manchester area. 11 March 2010, 5:44 pm

Key facts, figures and dates 11 March 2010, 3:51 pm

Robots and autonomous vehicles could soon be picking fruit and harvesting crops on farms. 11 March 2010, 11:02 am

Back in 2002, I recall a story in Red magazine about a father who had allegedly collected the stem cells from his newborn baby's umbilical cord in the delivering hospital's car park. It said he had been handed the placenta - wrapped in newspaper - by the midwife and told... 17 March 2010, 1:44 pm

Acupuncture and Chinese herbal medicine do not provide any benefit to women trying to become pregnant, the British Fertility Society (BFS) has found after reviewing the available evidence. The new guidelines, published in the journal Human Fertility, state that there is 'currently no evidence' that these methods increase the success... 15 March 2010, 5:37 pm

A common gene variant has been linked to differences in pain sensitivity, according to a new study by scientists based at Cambridge University. The finding could help to explain why people have different pain thresholds and might help in the search for effective pain killers with tolerable side effects.... 15 March 2010, 5:36 pm

In their concluding remarks, all three speakers said the answer to the question implicit in the event's title - if you are genetically predisposed to a neurodevelopmental disorder, does this effectively mean you are marked for life? - is an emphatic 'no'. Nonetheless, they had divergent views on the likelihood... 15 March 2010, 5:01 pm

A donated human egg will be raffled on Wednesday to mark the launch of a new IVF service which helps UK women to access egg donation services in America. The new service, offered by the Bridge Centre in London, will allow patients to select egg donors on the basis of... 15 March 2010, 4:03 pm

Extraordinary Measures is the story of the desperation of a father to find a drug to prolong the lives of his sick children, Megan and Patrick, who both have an incurable genetic condition with a life expectancy of nine years of age.... 15 March 2010, 4:03 pm

Sequencing a patient's genome to find the genetic cause of their inherited disease has finally been proven to be a viable clinical approach in two recent independent studies. For some time gene sequencing has been heralded as ushering in a new era of medicine. However, until now, only around 10... 15 March 2010, 3:15 pm

The Australian federal five-year moratorium on the use of gender selection technology in IVF (in vitro fertilisation) treatment for so-called 'social' reasons ends this year, reopening this controversial debate. The Australian health watchdog, the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), confirmed that that it will be conducting a review... 15 March 2010, 2:10 pm

A couple in the US has taken a novel approach to meeting the cost of IVF (in vitro fertilisation) treatment. Rather than approaching the bank or re-mortgaging the family home, as some couples are reported to have done, Brandi and Shelton Koskie decided to try to raise the money required... 15 March 2010, 2:01 pm

Yves Bolduc, the Minister for Health in Quebec, Canada, has announced plans to introduce free fertility treatment through the extension of Medicare coverage. This move will fulfil Premier Jean Charest's 2008 campaign promise and will make Quebec the first jurisdiction in North America to offer fertility treatments free of charge.... 15 March 2010, 9:30 am

The UK's fertility industry regulator, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), has published new data on the success rates of fertility clinics across the country, enabling patients to find out the likely result of their treatment.... 15 March 2010, 9:25 am

Mental health is a huge global concern, with one in four people experiencing some form of mental health problem at some point in their lives. Psychiatric disorders are sometimes difficult to study, as they are diagnosed on the basis of observed behaviours... 12 March 2010, 2:56 pm

On Tuesday (9 March) the UK's Human Tissue Authority (HTA) took the unprecedented step of writing to more than 150 organisations to express our concerns that umbilical cord blood is being collected unlawfully, and that this activity may compromise safety and quality standards. Our letters were targeted at those we... 12 March 2010, 11:09 am

The UK's Human Tissue Authority (HTA) issued a press release this week warning of the dangers of collecting umbilical cord blood stem cells by those who are unqualified to do so. Cord blood is rich in stem cells that contain potentially powerful biological properties, which could be useful in the... 11 March 2010, 6:23 pm

Whether a stem cell develops into bone or fat can be determined by the type of mould it is grown in, scientists at the University of Chicago have found... 8 March 2010, 4:54 pm

Babies with few teeth on their first birthday are more likely to need corrective dental surgery by age 30, a study has found. The UK and Finnish researchers also discovered ten genetic variants influencing tooth development during a baby's first year... 8 March 2010, 4:20 pm

A drug dealer serving a life sentence is awaiting a Government decision on whether he can have artificial insemination, after being granted permission by prison bosses... 8 March 2010, 12:32 pm

Scientists have catalogued the genes of microbes living in our gut, information that could be crucial in assessing the impact of microbes on our health. The study, published in Nature, reports the sequencing of 3.3 million microbial genes, a gene set 150 times larger than the human genome.... 8 March 2010, 12:23 pm

A US company has been granted beneficial 'orphan drug' status by the American Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for an embryonic stem cell therapy it's developing to treat a rare form of blindness... 8 March 2010, 11:42 am

A genetic risk score based on several genetic markers associated with cardiovascular disease (CVD) does not improve the prediction of CVD risk, research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association has suggested... 8 March 2010, 11:31 am