IVF used by some to avoid passing on genetic diseases to offspring
By Jamie Talan,
The Washington Post
| 12. 04. 2021
By Fotograf Kallestad, Gorm / NTB Scanpix. CC BY NC 4.0
In vitro fertilization (IVF), widely known as a way to help infertile couples have babies, has taken on another remarkable use: It has become part of a procedure to help families keep from passing on serious genetic diseases to their children.
Parents who know they carry genetic mutations for muscular dystrophy, cystic fibrosis, sickle cell anemia, breast cancer, Huntington’s disease, Alzheimer’s and other inherited diseases can undergo IVF, where the mother’s eggs are collected and combined with sperm in a dish, and another procedure called preimplantation genetic testing (PGT), in which embryos are screened for the particular mutation and only disease-free embryos can be implanted in the mother.
“I don’t know why more people don’t embrace these technologies,” said Greg McGuire, 38, of Fishers, Ind., who was diagnosed with Becker muscular dystrophywhen he was 8 years old, one of several family members with the inherited genetic mutation. Because it is passed down from mother to son — and his mother only had sisters — no one in the...
Related Articles
By Elizabeth Dwoskin and Zoeann Murphy, The Washington Post | 10.01.2025
MEXICO CITY — When she walked into an IVF clinic in June, Alin Quintana knew it would be the last time she would try to conceive a child. She had prepared herself spiritually and mentally for the visit: She had traveled to a nearby...
By Rob Stein, NPR | 09.30.2025
Scientists have created human eggs containing genes from adult skin cells, a step that someday could help women who are infertile or gay couples have babies with their own genes but would also raise difficult ethical, social and legal issues...
By Jessica Mouzo, El País | 10.03.2025
DNA is the molecule of life: this double-helix structure, present in every cell in the body and organized into fragments called genes, stores the instructions for making organisms function. It is a highly precise biological machine, but sometimes it breaks...
GeneWatch UK has prepared a briefing on the genetic modification of nature for the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Congress in October 2025
The upcoming Congress claims to be “where the world comes together to set priorities and drive conservation and sustainable development action.” A major concern for those on the outside is that the Congress may advance plans to develop and encourage the use of synthetic biology in nature conservation. This could at first glance sound like...