Another baby born to wrong woman in IVF mix-up

Another IVF mix-up has resulted in a baby being born to the wrong couple — this time in Australia.

The error reportedly occurred at Monash IVF’s Brisbane clinic. According to reports, the mistake was revealed in February, after the unnamed birth parents requested to transfer their remaining embryos to another IVF clinic. An ‘extra’ embryo was found in the couple’s storage compartment, which led to the discovery that another patient’s embryo had been implanted in the mother, later leading to the birth of a child that was not biologically hers.

Monash IVF CEO Michael Knaap maintained that the mix-up was an “isolated incident” and offered an apology.

“On behalf of Monash IVF, I want to say how truly sorry I am for what has happened,” Knaap in a statement. “We will continue to support the patients through this extremely distressing time.”

He promised to take steps to ensure it would not happen again.

READ: California couple sues after giving birth to another couple’s baby in IVF mixup

“We are reinforcing all our safeguards across our clinics – we also commissioned an independent investigation and are committed to implementing its recommendations in full,” he added.

Despite these statements, reports of IVF mix-ups are on the rise, especially as more people turn to methods like IVF to have children. Most recently, a woman in Georgia sued after she gave birth to the wrong child; the baby was later removed from her care and placed with his biological parents. Similar mix-ups have been reported in Israel, California, and Utah, among other places.

It is also not the first time that Monash IVF has come under fire; last year, it reached a $56 million settlement after wrongfully destroying healthy embryos. Both incidents underscore the reality that technologies like IVF come with the very real possibility that human error can result in the destruction — or, in this case, complete upheaval — of human lives.

Australian authorities have given few details about what has happened to the baby, or who currently has custody of the child. Per Queensland law, where the incident took place, a child’s birth mother and her partner would be considered the legal parents, not the biological parents.