Babies born as a result of in vitro fertilisation are three times more likely to develop cancer, a study from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) has revealed.
The research, published in the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology, tracked over 200,000 babies born between 1991-2014 in Israel’s Soroka hospital, and monitored the group until the age of 18.
What they found was that 1,498 cancerous growths were diagnosed, and the children who were born from IVF were the most likely to have them.
The study recommends follow-up health checks for IVF babies
The study recommends that children born through fertility treatments need closer monitoring than those conceived naturally, and should be subjected to regular health checks.
“The research concludes that the association between IVF and total pediatric neoplasms and malignancies is significant,” says Prof. Eyal Sheiner, Vice Dean of the BGU Faculty of Health Sciences (FOHS). “With increasing numbers of offspring conceived after fertility treatments, it is important to follow up on their health.”
Of the 242,187 infants studied, 237,863 (98.3 per cent) were conceived spontaneously; 2,603 (1.1 per cent) were conceived via in vitro fertilisations, and 1,721 (0.7 percent) were conceived after ovulation induction treatments.
While the study isn’t the first to investigate IVF and paediatric cancer risk, it is the first to monitor the group into adulthood.
