Pregnancy following intracytoplasmic sperm injection treatment with dead husband's spermatozoa: ethical and policy considerations

This paper describes the first pregnancy in a childless widow afterintracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) treatment with her deceasedhusband's spermatozoa which had been stored for nearly 3 years before use.Before his death the husband had received treatment for testicular cancerand he had given the appropriate written consent for the future use of hisspermatozoa. Of the 10 eggs injected, six resulted in normal embryos. Threeembryos were transferred and the remaining three embryos are currentlystored for possible future use. The treatment resulted in a continuingsingleton pregnancy. The case demonstrated the suitability of ICSI in thosedifficult cases where the sperm quality is extremely poor. This success isalso compared with a widely debated case of another widow who was refusedpermission to use her deceased husband's spermatozoa. It is concluded thatin the case of posthumous use of frozen spermatozoa, the current laws areconveniently applicable in a chronic illness but not so in an acute illnessleading to death. In the light of the wide public debate on the issuesraised by this legal case, the UK Government has also decided to conduct areview of consent procedures involving the storage and use of geneticmaterial.