According to emerging reports, history is due to be made in the UK following the announcement that doctors have been given the go-ahead to perform the first womb transplant the country has ever seen.

With approval having been granted by a special committee at Imperial College London, ten British women will be given the opportunity to carry their own children.in the upcoming months.

High hopes have been placed on the groundbreaking procedure following its success rates in Sweden, with Richard Smith - a consultant gynaecologist at the Queen Charlotte's and Chelsea Hospital - expressing his delight at the welcome development.

Having worked on the project for 19 years, the 55-year-old medical professional is said to be 'really, really pleased' that approval has finally been granted.

With one in 5,000 women born without a womb and thousand others losing theirs to cancer, Mr. Smith is at pains to highlight the complex nature of their struggle.

"Infertility is a difficult thing to treat for these women. Surrogacy is an option, but it does not answer the deep desire that women have to carry their own baby. For a woman to carry her own baby - that has to be a wonderful thing," he enthused.
 


While in excess of 100 women have been identified as potential recipients of womb donors, just ten will be chosen to undergo the clinical trial due for launch in the spring.

Unsurprisingly, certain criteria must be met in order to avail of the service and those chosen must be 38 or under, have a long-term partner and be a healthy weight.

The process involves creating an embryo from the couple's sperm and eggs before the women undergoes a six-hour transplant from a donor whose heart was still beating, but had been pronounced brain dead.

Following a 12-month course of immunosuppressant drugs, the ten chosen women will be implanted with their embryos in the hopes of achieving a successful pregnancy.

Should the women at the centre of the trial bear a child, they will be given one more chance to become pregnant before the womb is removed by surgeons - a necessary measure in order to prevent an increased risk of cancer brought about by the immunosuppressant drugs.

Commenting on the financial aspect of the trial which is estimated to cost in excess of £500,000, Mr. Smith asserted: "I've always been an enormous optimist. The project has run with no money from the start. Somehow or other, somebody has always turned up and given us enough money to keep it going."

Should the trial be successful, the first British baby born as a result of a womb transplant will arrive in late 2017 or 2018.

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