International Fertility Group marketed three-parent IVF to women over 35 abroad, investigation finds

An eight-month investigation found that U.S.-based International Fertility Group helped clients access mitochondrial replacement techniques, also called three-parent IVF, through overseas clinics, including a partner in Albania. The reporting traced the company’s Chicago-area office to a high-end fertility clinic where an embryologist based in Slovakia traveled monthly to perform the procedure. Mitochondrial replacement combines nuclear DNA from two parents with mitochondrial DNA from a third person. In the United States the technique is illegal, while Britain permits it only at one academic center to reduce the risk of inherited mitochondrial disease.

The investigation found no peer-reviewed human studies supporting mitochondrial replacement as a treatment for infertility caused by aging, especially at age 35 or older. A 2023 Greek pilot reported possible benefit mainly among younger patients; for 12 patients aged 39, the live birth rate was below 10%. Researchers linked to International Fertility Group presented a 2025 conference abstract reporting live birth rates of 40% or higher among 66 patients with a mean age of 39, but scientists told STAT it lacked key information. Unpublished data from Kyiv’s Nadiya Clinic showed one birth among 19 patients aged 36 to 44.

The reporting placed the procedure inside a broader fertility-tourism pattern: clinics and agencies can market treatments where home-country rules are stricter, while oversight of claims, licensing, and cross-border coordination remains uneven. Britain’s narrow permission shows regulators separated a specific inherited-disease use from general infertility. The investigation described a chain of brokers, clinics and traveling specialists that made access possible even when the evidence base was thin. The Nadiya data and the Greek pilot suggest a gap between marketing and outcomes, particularly for women in their late 30s and 40s.

The stakes are highest for women paying tens of thousands of dollars for experimental care marketed as a solution to age-related infertility. The investigation found that some claims were not supported by peer-reviewed human trials and that unpublished data did not show benefit for advanced maternal age. For regulators, the findings highlight gaps in oversight when procedures move across borders through brokers and clinics. For patients, the evidence available is preliminary, observational or conference-level, which cannot establish efficacy or safety as a routine infertility treatment.