Baby ’selected’ without cancer gene

The first British baby genetically selected to be free of a breast cancer gene has been born, doctors have said.

She grew from an embryo screened to ensure it did not contain the faulty BRCA 1 gene, which passes the risk of breast cancer down generations. University College London said the the mother and her little girl were doing “very well”.

Any daughter born with the gene has a 50% to 85% of developing breast cancer.

Announcing her birth, Paul Serhal, medical director of the Assisted Conception Unit at the hospital, said: “This little girl will not face the spectre of developing this genetic form of breast cancer or ovarian cancer in her adult life.

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“The parents will have been spared the risk of inflicting this disease on their daughter. The lasting legacy is the eradication of the transmission of this form of cancer that has blighted these families for generations.”

In June the mother, then 27, told how she decided to undergo the screening process after seeing all her husband’s female relatives suffer the disease.