An urgent inquiry has been ordered by the Government into whether families should be allowed to choose the sex of their children using a controversial new fertility technique.
In a move which plunges the Department of Health into the difficult ethical area of 'designer babies', officials have asked the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) to look at the issue of family 'gender balancing'.
The authority, which regulates fertility issues, will investigate claims that couples are already being offered 'sperm sorting' techniques to decide whether they want a boy or a girl. Although licensed clinics are not allowed to offer gender selection services except for medical reasons, a legal loophole means private unlicensed clinics can.
The controversial service has been attacked by the Catholic Church, members of the British Medical Association and Lord Winston, the Government health adviser, who has warned that the technique could lead to genetic defects in babies.
HFEA officials said there was evidence that three private clinics in London, Birmingham and Glasgow were offering sperm sorting. For up to £3,500, parents can take advantage of the service, in which sperms are spun at high speed to separate those carrying the X chromosome (female) from those carrying the Y chromosome (male).
One website of a gender clinic based in London offers advice on how to get the treatment, originally developed in America for breeding livestock. In the United States more than 200 parents have been through the procedure, with a success rate of between 70 and 80 per cent.
HFEA officials told The Observer that of particular concern are claims that families with strong religious beliefs are using the technique to try to ensure male heirs rather than daughters. Other families who have suffered bereavement often want to have another child of the same sex as the one that has died.
British law says that parents are only able to select the sex of their child if there is a substantial risk that gender-related hereditary or genetic diseases could be passed on. 'Family balancing', where the reasons for sex selection are social rather than medical, is not allowed at licensed clinics. Private, unlicensed clinics are not breaking the law, though, by offering the technique.
The Department of Health said that the HFEA review could open the door to sex selection for 'family balancing' reasons at licensed clinics. 'There is a need for a review of the new procedures and the use of sperm sorting in the UK,' a spokesman said. 'We need to know about the safety of the technique and the best way to take the issue forward. Whatever the outcome of the review, sex selection for social reasons will not be allowed on the NHS.'
HFEA sources admitted that the issue of gender balancing for social reasons would have to be looked at.
'We last had a widespread consultation on this in 1993,' said one HFEA policy officer. 'We need to know whether public opinion has moved on and certainly see where the science has moved to.'