A series of board resignations has hit the federal agency which is supposed to police Canada’s burgeoning fertility industry. Three directors have left Assisted Human Reproduction Canada (AHRC) in three months. “It’s obviously a mess,” Diane Allen, head of the Infertility Network, told the National Post. “Some sort of investigation or explanation ought to be forthcoming... This is about the creation of human life, and the purpose of the [law] is to safeguard the health and safety of fertility patients and the children born to them, and the agency is charged with overseeing that.”

The AHRC will license and oversee heath standards and ethics once regulations are in place. However, it is still awaiting a Supreme Court ruling on whether it has jurisdiction to conduct inspections and enforce standards.

Behind the scenes, there also seems to have been conflict within the board on fundamental issues. The seven remaining directors include a former Conservative premier of Nova Scotia and three people who have espoused conservative positions on abortion and embryonic stem-cell research. “We’re left in the dark,” says MP Megan Leslie. “It’s alarming. Why are these people leaving, and leaving behind folks I perceive as more in line with Conservative ideology?” ~ National Post, May 30; CNews, May 30