IVF parents 'exploited' by offer to store stem cells

PARENTS are being exploited by a scheme which allows them to store stem cells from spare IVF embryos, Britain's leading fertility expert said yesterday.

Lord Robert Winston criticised a service being run in the United States where couples can "bank" the cells in the hope that they can be used in the future if their child develops an illness such as Parkinson's disease.

And he warned there was no evidence that the cells would actually be of use in the future.

StemLifeLine, a California-based company, runs a scheme to store stem cells from leftover embryos. Its website urges visitors to "think of our service as investment for the future".

Research backing the scheme was announced at the Amer- ican Society for Reproductive Medicine's conference in Washington yesterday.

Some scientists believe that embryonic stem cells - which have the potential to grow into any type of tissue - could be used in treatments for diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.

The latest scheme would harvest stem cells from the core of embryos which were previously frozen.

But Lord Winston said:

"It's a clear example of the exploitation of the worries of a couple about the fate of their children.

"There is no scientific evidence to sustain the notion this will be a useful procedure.

"I would be horrified if anyone tried this in Britain. It is an attempt to make large sums of money."

Several companies in the UK currently offer parents the chance to store umbilical-cord blood, which contains stem cells. But it is embryonic stems cells which are seen by many to hold the most promise.

Professor Stephen Minger, of King's College London, said it was "too early" to start banking stem cells in the hope of new treatments in the future.

He added: "It is just like cord-blood banking, taking all the dreams of having personalised cells that you can use to treat Parkinson's disease when you're older, and it is all the same kind of pie in the sky."

A spokesman for the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority said it was unlikely a British firm would be granted a licence to store stem cells in the UK at present.

And Josephine Quintavalle, of campaign group Comment on Reproduction Ethics, said creating and holding embryos for "spare parts" was "horrendous".

She added: "We could go from storing stem cells from embryos to storing the whole embryo to use other parts in the future. The goalposts move at a frightening speed and who knows what we could be doing in the future?"