Victorian Current Acts

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RESEARCH INVOLVING HUMAN EMBRYOS ACT 2008 - SECT 3

Definitions

    (1)     In this Act—

"accredited ART centre "means a person or body accredited to carry out assisted reproductive technology by—

        (a)     the Reproductive Technology Accreditation Committee of the Fertility Society of Australia; or

        (b)     if the regulations prescribe another body or other bodies in addition to, or instead of, the body mentioned in paragraph (a)—that other body or any of those other bodies, as the case requires;

"AHEC "means the Australian Health Ethics Committee established by the National Health and Medical Research Council Act 1992 of the Commonwealth;

"animal" does not include a human;

assisted reproductive treatment has the meaning it has in the Assisted Reproductive Treatment Act 2008 ;

"Authority" means the Victorian Assisted Reproductive Treatment Authority established under Part 9 of the Assisted Reproductive Treatment Act 2008 ;

"Commonwealth Act" means the Research Involving Human Embryos Act 2002 of the Commonwealth;

"Commonwealth Authority" means the following—

        (a)     a body corporate established for a public purpose by or under a Commonwealth Act;

        (b)     a company in which a controlling interest is held by any one of the following persons together, or by two or more of the following persons together—

              (i)     the Commonwealth;

              (ii)     a body covered by paragraph (a);

              (iii)     a body covered by either subparagraph (i) or (ii);

"confidential commercial information" means information that has a commercial or other value that would be, or could reasonably be expected to be, destroyed or diminished if the information were disclosed;

"disclose", in relation to information, means give or communicate in any way;

excess ART embryo has the meaning given by section 4 ;

"HREC "means a Human Research Ethics Committee;

"human embryo" means a discrete entity that has arisen from either—

        (a)     the first mitotic division when fertilisation of a human oocyte by a human sperm is complete; or

        (b)     any other process that initiates organised development of a biological entity with a human nuclear genome that has the potential to develop up to, or beyond, the stage at which the primitive streak appears—

    and has not yet reached 8 weeks of development since the first mitotic division;

"human sperm" includes human spermatids;

"hybrid embryo" means—

        (a)     an embryo created by the fertilisation of a human egg by animal sperm; or

        (b)     an embryo created by the fertilisation of an animal egg by human sperm; or

        (c)     a human egg into which the nucleus of an animal cell has been introduced; or

        (d)     an animal egg into which the nucleus of a human cell has been introduced; or

        (e)     a thing declared by the regulations to be a hybrid embryo;

"inspector" means a person appointed under section 33(1) of the Commonwealth Act;

"licence "means a licence issued under section 15;

"NHMRC Licensing Committee" means the Committee established by section 13 of the Commonwealth Act;

"oocyte" means an ovum from a woman;

"partner", in relation to a person, means—

        (a)     the person's spouse; or

        (b)     another person who lives with the first person as a couple on a genuine domestic basis, irrespective of gender;

"precursor cell" means a cell that has the potential to develop into a human egg or human sperm;

"proper consent", in relation to the use of an excess ART embryo or a human egg, or the creation or use of any other embryo, means consent obtained in accordance with guidelines issued by the Chief Executive Officer of the NHMRC under the National Health and Medical Research Council Act 1992 of the Commonwealth and prescribed by the regulations under the Commonwealth Act for the purposes of the definition of proper consent in section 8 of that Act;

"research" includes an experimental procedure or clinical trial;

"responsible person" means—

        (a)     in relation to an excess ART embryo

              (i)     each person who provided the egg or sperm from which the embryo was created; and

              (ii)     the woman for whom the embryo was created, for the purpose of achieving her pregnancy; and

              (iii)     any person who was the partner of a person mentioned in subparagraph (i) at the time the egg or sperm mentioned in that paragraph was provided; and

              (iv)     any person who was the partner of the woman mentioned in subparagraph (ii) at the time the embryo was created; or

        (b)     in relation to an embryo other than an excess ART embryo—each person whose reproductive material, genetic material or cell was used, or is proposed to be used, in the creation or use of the embryo; or

        (c)     in relation to a human egg—the woman who was the biological donor of the egg;

"sperm" means sperm from a man;

"spouse", in relation to a person, means the person's husband or wife;

"store" means—

        (a)     to freeze an oocyte, embryo or sperm; or

        (b)     to otherwise preserve an oocyte, embryo or sperm by a prescribed method;

"the NHMRC" means the National Health and Medical Research Council established by the National Health and Medical Research Council Act 1992 of the Commonwealth;

"unsuitable for implantation", in relation to a human embryo, means a human embryo that—

        (a)     is diagnosed by pre-implantation genetic diagnosis as unsuitable for implantation, in accordance with the Ethical Guidelines on the Use of Assisted Reproductive Technology in Clinical Practice and Research (2007), issued by the Chief Executive Officer of the NHMRC; or

        (b)     is determined to be unsuitable for implantation in the body of a woman, in accordance with objective criteria specified in guidelines issued by the Chief Executive Officer of the NHMRC under the National Health and Medical Research Council Act 1992 of the Commonwealth and prescribed by the regulations under the Commonwealth Act for the purposes of paragraph (b) of the definition of unsuitable for implantation in section 7(1) of that Act;

"use "includes develop, or development, as the case requires;

"woman" means a female human.

    (2)         For the purposes of the definition of human embryo in subsection (1), in working out the length of the period of development of a human embryo, any period when the development of the embryo is suspended is to be disregarded.

    (3)     In this Act, a reference to an embryo is a reference to a human embryo, unless the contrary intention appears.

    (4)     A reference in this Act to an embryo (including a human embryo) is a reference to a living embryo.

    (5)     A reference in this Act to a human egg is a reference to a human oocyte.

    (6)     A reference in this Act to a human embryo does not include a reference to—

        (a)     a hybrid embryo; or

        (b)     a human embryonic stem cell line.



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