While researchers in countries including Sweden and the US have previously succeeded in transplanting wombs from living donors into women who have gone on to give birth, experts said the latest development was a significant advance.

“With a deceased donor, you reduce the risk because you don’t have the risk to the donor – and you reduce the costs, too, because you don’t have the hospitalisation and the very long surgery of the donor,” said Dr Dani Ejzenberg of the University of São Paulo, who led the research.

Ejzenberg said that finding a living donor could also be difficult, while coordinating operations was logistically challenging.