It is meant to regulate the practice that helps infertile couples conceive through in-vitro fertilisation but the Bill is called the Protection of Embryos Act.

The first reading, a mere formality, was approved by Parliament last Friday. Only the title of the Bill was presented and its contents remain unknown.

The Justice Ministry confirmed the Bill would be published only after it was discussed by the Nationalist Party’s parliamentary group. No date had yet been set for this meeting, the spokes-man added.

It is still unclear what bearing the name of the Bill will have on its contents but the spokesman defended the choice. “The government has always been in favour of life and, hence, the name of the Bill.”

The title implies more emphasis will be put on the embryo rather than the woman, prompting concerns that it would be medically restrictive and conservative in its approach.

Mark Brincat, head of obstetrics and gynaecology at Mater Dei Hospital, said he was waiting for a Bill on assisted reproductive medicine. “We await a move in that direction,” he said tellingly.

But according to Josie Muscat, doctor and owner of St James Hospital, the first and only private clinic to start offering IVF 20 years ago, the name could mean anything.

“It could limit the number of embryos a doctor may implant in the womb. It could prohibit embryo freezing. We have to wait and see what they come up with,” Dr Muscat said.

He was adamant the Bill should allow medical specialists enough leeway to take decisions best suited for their patients. It would be wrong for the Bill to impose strict limits on how many embryos should be transferred, he added.

“Fertility is such a complex issue that each case has to be judged on its own merits. The specialist, after discussing with the patient, should have the faculty to make decisions on how many embryos should be fertilised and transferred. A woman under 30 and a woman over 35 have different needs.”

Dr Muscat believes that the law should set up a regulatory authority with the ability to set medical protocols in line with developments in scientific research.

He insisted that medical science was a fast-paced field and a law that was very specific risked stifling developments since changing it would necessitate a cumbersome parliamen-tary procedure.

For Nationalist backbencher Jean Pierre Farrugia, the Bill’s name has little significance. “The German law that deals with medically-assisted procreation is meant to protect the embryo as well. I prefer waiting to know the contents of the Bill before commenting,” he said.

Two years ago, Dr Farrugia chaired a cross-party parliamentary committee that suggested embryo freezing and which later also embraced the less contentious egg freezing. Medical experts contend that, to avoid high-risk multiple pregnancies, a maximum of two embryos should be transferred to the woman’s womb. However, this creates other complications. Not all fertilised eggs survive and develop into embryos and, to heighten the chances of success, doctors normally fertilise more than two eggs.

Embryo freezing will be needed to store the unused embryos. This benefits the woman because, if the first cycle fails to produce a pregnancy, she will not have to undergo the uncomfortable and risky process of egg stimulation all over again. The second time around the woman will use the frozen embryos.

But embryo freezing is an ethical minefield with the central question being what will happen to unclaimed frozen embryos.

On the other hand, egg freezing – freezing a woman’s harvested eggs before fertilisation – avoids the ethical complications linked to embryos and the right to life ascribed to them by some people.

But rather than being mutually exclusive, some medical experts believe egg and embryo freezing should co-exist because, in trying to increase the chances of fertility, additional embryos may be created unintentionally.

Labour leader Joseph Muscat has said it did not make sense to table just the title without presenting the text of the IVF Bill.

He said a cross-parliamentary committee had reached a compromise on the issue and accused the government of delaying the introduction of an IVF Bill.