Briton in her 60s pregnant after IVF from 'clone' medic

Published on Thursday 4 May 2006 12:27

A BRITISH woman has become pregnant in her 60s after being given IVF treatment by a controversial Italian fertility doctor.

Patricia Rashbrook, a child psychiatrist from Lewes, East Sussex, is now seven months' pregnant after being treated by Severino Antinori.

Reports claim she is 63 - which would make her set to become the oldest British woman to give birth - although her husband, John Farrant, said she was younger.

He said: "My wife is seven months' pregnant. We are of course both very happy and looking forward to the birth. Obviously at our age it is quite daunting.

"I would not call it a miracle baby but an assisted conception."

Dr Rashbrook, who already has two children from her first marriage, flew to Rome last October for treatment.

Antinori, who runs a private fertility clinic in Rome, first made headlines in 1994 by helping a post-menopausal 63-year-old woman become pregnant with donor eggs and hormones.

He has said in the past he aimed to be the first to produce a baby cloned from an adult.

In 2004 he claimed that he knew of three cloned babies that had been born but refused to produce any evidence, citing legal reasons.

Previously Britain's oldest mother was hill farmer Liz Buttle, from Wales, who was 60 when she gave birth to Joseph in 1997.