Forty years since that first ray of baby hope shone brightest in Oldham

Forty years ago on July 25, 1978 at 11:47pm, the first test tube baby was delivered by C-section at Oldham General Hospital.

Weighing five pounds and 12 ounces, Louise Brown was a miracle baby for her parents Lesley and John Brown, who had been trying to conceive for nine years.

However, she was also a miracle for many thousands who had thought that childbirth would not be an option for them.

Four years after Louise’s birth, Lesley and John had a second daughter through IVF.

Natalie Brown was then the 40th IVF baby, and subsequently became the first IVF baby to give birth herself to a daughter.

Louise has since had two sons and is a proud advocate of in-vitro fertilisation (IVF).

Speaking of her parents’ struggle, Louise told the Independent: “When they heard about this experiment it gave them hope.”

The pioneering work of Robert Edwards (who received the Nobel Prize in medicine in 2010), Patrick Steptoe and Jean Purdy made Louise’s birth possible.

In 1983, the technique was developed to help women without eggs, and then in 1992 was extended to treat male infertility.

Now, estimates about the number of babies born through IVF range from an incredible six to eight million.

Beyond this, research the field has extended to help many other families.

Pre-implantation genetic diagnosis allows carriers of genetic diseases to screen embryos and implant only those which do not carry the relevant gene.

The method can now be used to screen for nearly 400 genetic conditions and has seen an increase in its use of 70% between 2011 and 2016.

Although these developments can be wonderful for those who are successful, IVF is very expensive and is statistically unlikely to be effective.

Sally Cheshire CBE, chair of The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) said: “For a fortunate minority, IVF has been the ‘miracle’ science that’s brought them the baby they’ve longed for.

“For the majority, however, it’s been a road filled with anguish, frustration and heartache.”

Although success rates have doubled in the last 25-30 years, this still only brought them to 30%.

Not everyone has welcomed these advancements.

Every step of embryonic research has been met with ethical criticism.

Around the birth of Louise Brown, people were concerned about the approximately 221 embryos which had been needed to prove the technique was possible, as well as around the doctors not sharing with her parents that IVF had never previously been effective.

Discomfort around embryonic science, and concerns about the creation of what were referred to as ‘Frankenbabies’, led to a report chaired by Mary Warnock in 1984.

The Warnock Report recommended the creation of an independent body, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, who are responsible for ensuring that embryonic research does not overstep the boundaries of ethics.

A particular area of concern is the idea of freezing embryos.

For some, this turns IVF from a last resort to a lifestyle choice, allowing women to defer childbirth until much later in life.

Even for advocates of the process, the large financial cost of multiple attempts can create priority based on wealth which, for some, is ethically problematic.

For the UK specifically, there could be further issues as the common standards of the EU Tissues and Cells Directives come into question with Brexit negotiations.

Regardless of these considerations, the birth of Louise Brown 40 years ago was the first stage in scientific advancements that continue to give the same hope that her parents had to people around the world.

Louise, as a strong advocate of allowing it to continue, says with regard to ethics, “you need to trust the medical councils, to say what they can do and what they can’t do.”

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