R v. Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, ex parte Blood.

Abstract

England's Court of Appeal, Civil Division, upheld the lower court decision that, without the necessary written consent of the deceased husband, the 1990 Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act prohibits the storage of his cryopreserved sperm and its use in artificial insemination by the widow. When doctors retrieved sperm from Stephen Blood, he was already comatose from meningitis and would die soon thereafter. His widow sought release of the sperm to her for posthumous conception. Without the actual existence of a written consent for cryopreservation and also for disposition upon death, both storage of the sperm and its later use are prohibited under the licensing statute. The court did not address common law issues concerning consent to the retrieval of sperm from an unconscious man because those issues were not argued. In dicta (nonbinding opinion), the court noted that written consent is not required under the statute in a case involving fresh, i.e., nonpreserved, sperm where the donor later dies. The court did uphold the right to appeal the licensing authority's refusal to authorize the widow's export of the sperm for insemination at a medical clinic in another state of the European Community, such as Belgium, as infringing on her right to treatment under Community law.