Crusader to re-register births

Stephen Blood died of meningitis

A widow who fought to have children using her dead husband's sperm will be re-registering her children's births next week.

Earlier this year Diane Blood won a legal battle to have her late partner recognised as the father.

The Human Fertilisation and Embryology (Deceased Fathers) Act 2003 will come into force on Monday.

This gives mothers like Mrs Blood, whose children were conceived after their fathers' deaths, a six-month window in which to re-register their children's births if they wish to name the deceased parent on the certificate.

Until now the child's parental details had to be left blank.

Stephen Blood will be acknowledged on his sons' birth certificates

On Thursday, Mrs Blood, 37, from Worksop, Nottinghamshire, has an appointment at Sheffield Registry Officer on Monday to re-register her two sons - Liam Stephen Blood, four, and 16-month-old Joel Michael Blood.

She said: "I'll have a lot of different feelings on Monday.

"It took such a long time for this to happen that it will be such a relief to get to the end of the road.

"The boys will obviously be quite young to remember what will be happening but I hope that at least Liam will be able to look back in years to come at the certificate and remember that he was there when the name was added.

Overseas clinic

"I think it will be a very important moment."

Mrs Blood's husband Stephen, died from bacterial meningitis after falling into a coma in 1995.

The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority originally refused to allow her to conceive using Stephen's sperm.

This decision was upheld in the High Court, but the Court of Appeal allowed her to have IVF treatment using her dead husband's sperm in a foreign clinic.