(10 of 10)
Vanderbilt's Soupart gives least three reasons for failure: 1) difficulties in the tiny egg the culture chamber into the uterus, 2) undetected chromosomal abnormalities that doom the egg before it has a chance to implant itself, and 3) interference in the acceptance of the egg by the very hormones that were used to encourage ovulation.
According to the British newspapers, all these critical steps in the Brown case — removal of the eggs, fertilization in the laboratory and implantation — took place in a small turn-of-the-century institution called Dr. Kershaw's Cot age Hospital, amid green fields about a mile from the hospital where Mrs. Brown awaits the birth. Steptoe has done much of his fertilization work there, using four rooms, plus a small adjoin theater, that are all protected by locks, sliding doors and a red warning light.
Ironically, Steptoe is able to pursue his expensive fertility work in part because of his earnings from legal abortions. He soon hopes to move to larger facilities and dreams of eventually building a center for reproductive studies.
From the very start, the efforts to give Lesley Brown a child went extremely well. As the pregnancy progressed, Steptoe and Edwards apparently even determined its sex from chromosomal examination. Lesley, however, is said to have insisted on not being told. She explained: "I've been waiting too long for this to be denied the surprise of learning whether the baby is a boy or girl at birth." Late in her pregnancy, Mrs. Brown was sent to the spacious and well-equipped maternity wing at Oldham. There she presumably underwent all the most advanced testing: ultrasonic scanning to check the position, size and bodily shape of the fetus as it developed; monitoring of hormone levels and fetal heart beat; and perhaps withdrawal of amniotic fluid from the womb to determine whether the child had Down's syndrome (mongolism), the congenital malformation called spina bifida or any number of other genetic defects. Had the doctors detected any serious problems, Lesley Brown could have quickly received an abortion. Observed Dr. Stuart J. Steele of London's Middlesex Hospital Medical School: "Mrs. Brown would have had all the very close medical supervision that one would expect in a particularly precious pregnancy."
How that precious pregnancy turns out will shortly be known; one estimated due date is Aug. 4, but a swing of two weeks on either side is perfectly normal. Steptoe and Edwards, for their part, must surely feel highly confident; otherwise these experienced researchers would never have allowed the pregnancy to go so far. Yet on the eve of what may well be the most awaited birth in perhaps 2,000 years, there are also still many unanswered questions. For the Brown family, it is whether their test-tube child is healthy and can ever hope to have anything resembling a normal life. For the doctors, it is whether they have pushed medicine to a new frontier or set it dramatically back by creating a medical disaster. For the world at large, it is whether doctors should be free to continue such daring exploits or whether new restraints should be posted to keep them from poaching on nature's domain. There is a very large gathering in the waiting room for Baby Brown. ∙