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The Irish Times has reported that a fertility clinic with the Beacon Medical Group is to offer genetic screening of embryos for the first time in Ireland.

The clinic will inform parents if their child has an inherited disease such as cystic fibrosis.

The Life Institute said that offering pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, or PGD, with a view to destroying embryos was "profoundly unethical".

"These techniques are sold as offering hope to parents who long for a child," said the Life Institute. "But what if that child, at embryo stage, is found to have a disability? PGD leads to that child being destroyed. This makes commodities of children, and raises disturbing ethical questions about the value of life and the respect afforded to people with disabilities."

The Life Institute said that if the Irish Medicines Board granted permission for PGD it was difficult to see barriers remaining to sex-selection screening and other abuses.

The Irish Times report said that several clinics in Ireland also hope to begin another form of genetic screening soon involving analysing the chromosomes of embryos, to identify if the human embryo might have Down syndrome or other conditions. In Britain, 90% of children with Downs Syndrome are aborted.