Doctors in the UK have confirmed the successful birth of the first baby created using DNA from three people. The child was born via a new IVF procedure that involved using two eggs from two different women. While the process had been legal for several years researchers were just now able to get it right and birth the first child from the procedure.
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Why Are They Doing This?
The procedure is called Mitochondrial Donation Treatment (MDT) and it uses tissue from the egg of a healthy female donor to create IVF embryos free of harmful mutations mothers might possess, carry, and pass down to their children. Essentially meaning that an embryo, resulting in a baby, combines sperm and an egg from the biological parents, and mitochondria (cells) from a donor’s egg resulting in a birthed baby with DNA from three people. According to The Guardian, a baby would only have about 37 genes from the donor while 99.8% of their DNA would be from their mother and father.
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Mitochondrial Diseases
For those who know they could pass mitochondrial diseases to their children, natural conception is often a gamble. Sometimes babies can be born healthy while other times a baby might inherit severe and often fatal diseases. One in 6,000 babies is affected by mitochondrial disorders.
The Procedure
The procedure is a risk in and of its own, though, for some who wish not to pass on illness, it is a risk they are willing to take. Inevitably some of the abnormal mitochondrial DNA will pass over to the baby, so even with the procedure a baby could still inherit what the parents are hoping to prevent. Some mothers who know they could pass on life-threatening issues to their children adopt or have IVF with a donor egg instead. This new process could change things up and give women a chance to birth a child with their own DNA and prevent them from having life-threatening diseases like Cancer, and Alzheimer’s Disease.
