Bioethics News: November 2025 – February 2026

UK clinical trial into puberty blockers on children put on hold

A clinical study examining the use of puberty blockers in children has been put on hold after the UK’s medicines regulator advised that participants should be at least 14 years old, citing an ‘unquantified risk’ of potential long‑term biological harm. Because of this, discussions between the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency and the trial’s sponsor, King’s College London, are continuing. Recruitment for the trial will not proceed until the issues raised by the regulator have been resolved. The study was initiated following recommendations from the Cass Review, which found that existing evidence supporting the benefits of puberty blockers for young people with gender dysphoria was of poor quality.¹

Eugenic selection of embryos in the UK

Some UK couples undertaking IVF are reportedly using a legal loophole to obtain genetic predictions of IQ, height, and health for their embryos. Although UK clinics are prohibited from offering this type of embryo selection using polygenic scores (which is a numerical aggregate of the effects of many genetic variants for a specific biological trait), patients can legally request their embryos’ raw genetic data under data protection rules. A number of them have then forwarded this information to overseas companies for analysis in order to attempt to select the embryos resulting from IVF based on what they believe are positive traits, which is a form of eugenic selection.²

However, critics warn that the use of polygenic scores lacks scientific reliability and raises ethical concerns because their predictive value for individual health outcomes is limited. For complex traits, polygenic scores generally account for only a small fraction of heritability (the proportion of trait variation within a population that can be attributed to genetic differences) which itself typically represents only part of the total causal landscape. Consequently, polygenic scores estimates cannot provide the same level of certainty as tests for a condition that is caused by a high‑impact gene variant.³

Danish sperm bank requires donors to have a certain IQ and police clearance

A sperm bank called Donor Network, in Denmark, now demands that men be above a specific IQ level and have a police clearance certificate demonstrating no criminal record before becoming sperm donors. This means that all donors undergo a standardised test to measure abstract and logical thinking abilities, which does not rely on acquired knowledge or language skills. The results are then added to the donor’s profile, alongside other health information, to give more transparency to individuals selecting a donor.

The CEO of Donor Network, Jakub Knudsen, indicated that: ‘IQ is a strong predictor of, not just academic success and income, but also mortality, risk of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, etc and has a high heritability of 50-80 percent’.⁴ However, such testing can again be considered as a form of eugenic selection.⁵ Beyond cognitive testing, Danish regulations require all potential donors to undergo genetic screening and medical evaluations, and each donor is legally limited to assisting in creating no more than 12 families.⁶

Petition to inform patients if vaccine was developed from aborted human foetus cell lines

A Westminster Parliament petition, spearheaded by the Scottish Council on Human Bioethics, is calling on the UK Government to ensure that vaccine information leaflets for patients disclose whether cells originating from an aborted child were used to produce or develop the vaccine. This would then enable patients to make an informed decision, based on their conscience, whether or not to accept the treatment.

The aim of the petition is to encourage the UK government to take seriously the conflicts of conscience of many in the UK towards abortion. It is concerning that the UK Government is not making any effort to develop alternative vaccines which were not derived from cells originating from aborted foetuses. It is just seeking to continue with its present arrangements. The petition can be accessed here.

Abortion numbers record high of 299,614 across UK

Abortion statistics released by the UK Department of Health and Social Care show the highest number of abortions ever recorded in England and Wales, with 278,740 taking place in 2023, an increase of 26,618 (10.6%) from 2022. When added to the record 18,242 abortions that took place in Scotland in 2023 and the record 2,632 estimated number of abortions that took place in Northern Ireland in 2023, this takes the estimated total number of abortions across the United Kingdom for 2023 to a record 299,614. The statistics for 2023 also show a rise in repeat abortions for residents of England and Wales from 102,689 in 2022 up to 117,165 in 2023. This is a 14.1% increase from 2022.

In England and Wales, there were 3,205 disability-selective abortions in 2023. This represents a 2.6% increase in disability-selective abortions. There were 300 late-term abortions for babies with disabilities at 24 weeks and over, an increase of 44 from 2022, when there were 256 disability-selective abortions. There were also 5 late-term abortions at 24 weeks and over where a baby had a cleft lip or cleft palate.

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1. Nadeem Badshah, ‘UK clinical trial into puberty blockers on hold after medicines regulator steps in’, The Guardian,  20 February 2026. ↩︎
2. Hannah Devlin, ‘UK IVF couples use legal loophole to rank embryos based on potential IQ, height and health’, The Guardian, 6 December 2025; Calum MacKellar, Christianity and the New Eugenics, London: IVP, 2020. ↩︎
3. Angus Clarke, ‘The clinical applicability of polygenic scores in PGT’, BioNews 1318, 8 December 2025. ↩︎
4. Quoted in Barbara Kramarz, ‘One Danish sperm bank is screening candidates with IQ tests’, BioNews 1318, 8 December 2025. ↩︎
5. Calum MacKellar, Christianity and the New Eugenics, London: IVP, 2020. ↩︎
6. Barbara Kramarz, ‘One Danish sperm bank is screening candidates with IQ tests’, BioNews 1318, 8 December 2025. ↩︎