Court quashes another part of assisted-fertility law

(ANSA) - Rome, May 14 - The Constitutional Court has ruled that a ban on fertile couples who carry genetic pathologies from accessing medically-assisted fertility techniques to avoid passing the conditions on to their children is illegitimate, ANSA sources said Thursday. The ruling strikes down a part of the so-called Law 40 that bans screening embryos for pathologies before they are implanted in assisted fertility treatments. The 2003 law forbids the screening of embryos for abnormalities or genetic disorders, even for couples with a history of genetic disease, and denied women the right to refuse implantation once their eggs have been fertilised.
    Last year the Constitutional Court ruled invalid another big part of Law 40 - a ban on the use of donor sperm and eggs for infertile couples.