Specialists question effectiveness of sex selection technique

Infertility specialists have expressed concern that media coverage of a technique claiming to virtually guarantee the sex of a fetus might have raised unrealistic expectations about its potential to prevent sex linked inherited conditions. US researchers reported that the technique, which uses flow cytometry to separate sperm carrying X and Y chromosomes, was “unambiguous in assigning gender in 90 per cent of 284 embryos” in which it was used. Of these, 92% were female and 8% were male. When the group had previously carried out preimplantation genetic diagnosis, on embryos in which the sorting technique had not been used, they had found more or less equal numbers of male and …