'To see babies born at the end of this is just amazing'

EIGHT babies have been born in the UK thanks to a groundbreaking three-person IVF technique to prevent devastating disease, world-first data shows.

- JANE KIRBY

Four boys and four girls, including one set of identical twins, have been delivered and are all doing well after treatment by a team in Newcastle, who pioneered the technique.

One other woman is currently pregnant.

The scientific method, known as mitochondrial donation treatment, is designed to prevent children from being born with mitochondrial diseases that are passed down from their mothers.

These illnesses can be fatal and often cause devastating damage to organs, including the brain, muscle, liver, heart and kidney.

Of the eight babies born, three are now aged under six months, two are aged six to 12 months, one is 12-18 months old, one is 18-24 months and one child is aged over two.

All the babies are healthy and are meeting their milestones, according to the team from Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Newcastle University and Newcastle Fertility Centre.

None of the eight babies shows signs of having mitochondrial DNA disease, which tends to affect around one in 5,000 births.

The scientists said disease-causing mitochondrial DNA mutations, picked up in three of the children, are either undetectable or present at levels that are unlikely to cause disease.

The main lab method used by the team, known as pronuclear transfer (PNT), involves taking the egg from an affected mother, sperm from her partner, and an egg from a donor who is free from disease.

The mother of a baby girl born through mitochondrial donation said: “As parents, all we ever wanted was to give our child a healthy start in life. Mitochondrial donation IVF made that possible. After years of uncertainty, this treatment gave us hope - and then it gave us our baby.

“We look at them now, full of life and possibility, and we're overwhelmed with gratitude. Science gave us a chance.”