Prior to 25 July 1978, couples across the world had little to no hope of having a child if they didn’t fall pregnant naturally within the first few years of trying to conceive. Doctors, nurses, and clinics failed to find answers and solutions – stumped by the absence of a technology that, in 2024, means a child is born every 4.3 seconds. Instead, infertile men and women, as well as those suffering from gynaecological and prostate issues, were just deemed ‘unlucky’. As if luck had anything to do with it. 

On a mission to change this was surgeon Patrick Steptoe, embryologist Jean Purdy, and scientist Robert Edwards, who joined forces to beat both the odds and religious protests to quite literally crack the genetic code and create the world’s first ‘test tube’ baby. Their story is now the subject of new Netflix film, Joy, released on 22 November 2024 – specifically highlighting the work of Purdy, portrayed in the film by New Zealand actress Thomasin McKenzie, who in the aftermath of IVF’s success was often left out of media and scientific reports, with her work being credited to Steptoe and Edwards. At a lecture in 1998 to an audience of specialists on the 20^th anniversary of clinical IVF, Edwards was forced to point out: “There were three original pioneers in IVF, not just two”.

The IVF journey actually began in 1969, when Edwards (James Norton) first fertilised an egg outside the womb at Dr Kershaw’s Cottage Hospital in Oldham, Manchester. Alongside Steptoe (Bill Nighy), the pair of scientists successfully implanted 282 women. Five became pregnant but none delivered a living baby. Finding the source of this biological conundrum became their life’s work, and the film follows them as they join forces with Purdy – dubbed the world’s first embryologist – whose understanding of the female body and unwavering commitment ultimately delivered the result people across the world so desperately wanted: a treatment for infertility. 

Not everyone took their work seriously. Working out of a small lab at Kershaw’s Cottage Hospital and with permission only to do their research in their spare time – Edwards was an academic at University of Cambridge, Steptoe was an NHS consultant in Oldham, and Purdy was a research assistant at Cambridge University Physiological Laboratory – they financed the entire process themselves. While Edwards and Steptoe worked full-time elsewhere, it fell to Purdy to manage the laboratory, prepare the equipment, record the data and act as a pillar of emotional support for patients. 

The trio intended to use a laparoscopy technique to collect eggs from the ovaries, fertilise them in vitro (in a test tube or petri dish) and then place the embryos back in the womb. This meant they could bypass the fallopian tubes, which are a common cause of infertility. At the time, little was known about human embryology and the research provoked moral and religious outrage, with some groups claiming the scientists were “trying to do God’s work”. For this reason, funding for the research was often refused but, in Edwards’ own words, it was nothing to do with religion, but to simply “cure childlessness”. Although never confirmed, it’s been reported that both Purdy and Edwards said: “Nobody says the same thing about spectacles and dentures, so why shouldn’t human ingenuity address infertility as it has myopia and tooth decay?”

Image: Daily Mail

Thomasin McKenzie as Jean Purdy. Image: Kelly Brown/Netflix

Despite the lack of support and financing from the NHS, UK government and the public, the maverick pioneers weren’t dissuaded and during their decade-long project, hundreds of women volunteered their eggs for research before the hope for infertility treatment. That hope came to fruition, however, when IVF patients Lesley and John Brown gave birth to a daughter, Louise Joy, on 25 July 1978. Now 46 and living in Bristol with her husband and two sons, she told The Telegraph: “My mum hated the attention. She was shy, quiet, and just wanted a baby. She and my dad had been trying for nine years. She hadn’t even known she was the first successful IVF pregnancy until quite late on, so it was a shock.”

Brown was swiftly followed by the world’s first IVF baby boy, Alastair MacDonald, born in January 1979. Despite the scientific breakthrough making headlines across the world, the NHS still refused to support the service, encouraging Purdy to find an old Jacobean manor house close to Cambridge in 1980 and transform it into the world’s first IVF clinic, Bourn Hall, where she led the fertility services as its director. Since its foundation, 20,000 babies have been born through Bourn Hall, and more than 12 million IVF babies have been born worldwide since Brown in 1978.

Tragically, Purdy did not see her work recognised, dying of a malignant melanoma on 16 March 1985, aged just 39. During her battle with cancer, Bourn Hall arranged a room where she could still be part of the team and receive guests – and she worked until her dying day. Three years later, Steptoe also passed away, meaning by the time IVF was recognised with a Nobel Prize in 2010, Edwards was the only one able to receive it (the prize isn’t awarded posthumously). 

“I have always regarded Robert Edwards as like a grandfather to me,” Brown told BBC News. “His work, along with Patrick Steptoe, has brought happiness and joy to millions of people all over the world by enabling them to have children. I am glad that he lived long enough to be recognised with a Nobel prize for his work, and his legacy will live on with all the IVF work being carried out throughout the world.”

Highlighted in Netflix’s Joy, however, is the team’s praise for Purdy. Although she never received the accolades she deserved, she gave something people across the world who struggled to conceive had lost: hope. And with the development of IVF, nurtured further by international scientists and now available to couples in the UK on the NHS, she essentially offered them something they never thought in their wildest dreams they could have: their own little bundle of joy. 

Joy is on Netflix from 22 November 2024. 

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