Couple fly 4,000 miles to have children

Last updated at 11:45 26 September 2006


A London couple desperate to have children flew 4,000 miles for a fertility treatment banned in the UK because it is too dangerous.

Faisal and Farhana Shaukat went to Pakistan after failing to conceive for six years, including two years of unsuccessful NHS treatment.

They are now celebrating the birth of healthy triplets.

But doctors today warned Mrs Shaukat the babies’

health had been put at risk after doctors implanted four embryos into her womb.

Fertility specialists in the UK are usually banned from transferring more than two.

Mr Shaukat, 36, an IT management consultant and parttime lecturer, said: "We have been trying to have a baby since we got married six

years ago."

"We had endless hospital appointments and were getting nowhere. We were never told why we were having difficulties."

"It was such a slow and painful service. We both

found it very upsetting."

Mr Shaukat said they decided to go to Pakistan

because of the cheaper treatment available and the

chance of having more embryos transferred than is

allowed in the UK, which they believed would improve their chances.

The couple, from Newbury Park in Essex, paid £2,500 for fertility treatment in Islamabad - compared with an average of £4,000 in Britain.

They spent two weeks in Pakistan while Mrs Shaukat

was treated. Then she stayed on, with family, until she was three months pregnant.

In total they estimate the treatment, flights and other expenses came to £3,500.

Mr Shaukat said: "We had investigated how much it

would cost to go private an figured out that it was much more cost-effective to go to

Pakistan."

Even if you go private here there is still a waiting list. In Pakistan we didn’t have to wait at all."

The couple’s daughters Rija and Hiba and son Aayan were born weighing just over 5lb at King George Hospital in Goodmayes, Essex, on 12

September.

Five days later they were allowed to go home.

UK guidelines say that because 94 per cent of women under 35 will conceive naturally after trying for three years, couples are generally only sent for tests after failing to fall pregnant after one year.

After exhaustive tests, the common practice is to try artificial insemination then IVF - most couples are entitled to one free cycle on the NHS.

But Mr and Mrs Shaukat, a 34-year-old IT lecturer, felt abandoned by the system and decided to return to their native Pakistan for ICSI, a sophisticated treatment where a single sperm is injected into an egg which is later transplanted into the womb.

At present the Human Fertilisation and Embryology

Authority only allows women under 40 to have two embryos transferred because multiple births raise the risk of defects such as cerebral palsy.

Risks to mothers are also considerable.

The number of embryos allowed to be implanted could be reduced to one in the future.

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