Italy’s high court overturns donor gamete ban

Italy’s constitutional court overturned a ban on using donor sperm and eggs in fertility treatments, knocking down part of a divisive set of restrictions on assisted reproduction.

The court said in a statement the ban breached the constitution, without going into further detail, and lawyers in the case said the ruling was effective immediately.

Couples in predominantly Catholic Italy have launched a string of legal challenges to restrictions included in “Law 40”, passed by the then center-right government of Silvio Berlusconi in 2004.

Treatments such as artificial insemination and in vitro fertilization (IVF) have become increasingly popular across the Western world.

But in Italy, they have been opposed by a conservative establishment influenced by the Catholic Church, which rejects non-traditional conception and opposes the discarding of embryos with defects, believing an embryo should be treated as a person from the moment of conception.

Read the full, original story: Italian court overturns divisive ban on donor eggs, sperm

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