ABSTRACT
In Australia and the UK, as in a number of other jurisdictions, diagnostic testing of an embryo prior to implantation preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) is permitted primarily to avoid the birth of a child with a 'serious' disability or illness. Indeed, this distinction is relied on to draw a sharp line between permissible and impermissible PGD for sex selection in both the UK and Australia. The above idea that what constitutes a serious disability is contextually determined would seem to stand in tension with the impulse for state regulation of access to PGD. The use of PGD to deselect male embryos in families where there is a history of autism spectrum disorder has been approved in both Western Australia and Victoria and rejected by the UK HFEA licensing committee. The UK has regulated to permit access to and use of PGD in some manner since 1990, direct reference to PGD in the HFE Act first occurred with the 2008 amendments.
