Gay dads cleared of breaking clinical trial rules
Barrie and Tony Drewitt-Barlow, the UK’s first gay surrogate dads, have been cleared of faking the results of clinical trials.
The couple, who are parents to five children, including two sets of twins, denied five counts of contravening the Medicines for Human Use (Clinical Trials) Regulations.
The millionaire couple said the judge threw out the charges over concerns about the disclosure of evidence by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), which prosecuted the case.
The charges related to their company Euroderm Research, which went into liquidation in 2008. The business conducted tests for dermatological and cosmetic products.
The Drewitt-Barlows were charged with letting participants take part in trials more than once, failing to complete consent forms correctly and making a false application for an ethics committee opinion by saying Barrie was a nurse when he did not hold the necessary qualifications.
They made history in 1999 when they travelled to the US to conceive twins Saffron and Aspen through a surrogate mother. The couple now have three more children.
