A pensioner who became the world’s oldest mother at 66 through anonymous sperm and egg donations has died, leaving her twin sons orphaned and reigniting controversy over fertility treatment for older women.

María Carmen del Bousada de Lara, a single mother, died from cancer two years after giving birth to Christian and Pau. She was 69.

Ms Bousada learnt that she had a tumour before she gave birth to her sons at a clinic in Barcelona in December 2006.

The retired shop worker, one of four children from a middle-class family, sold her house in Cádiz to raise the £36,000 needed for the in vitro fertilisation treatment in America. Later she admitted lying to doctors about her age, claiming that she was 55 to get round age limits at the Pacific Fertility Centre in Los Angeles. She had not told her family about the purpose of her trip — but when the boys were born the news caused outrage among them, in Spain and around the world.

The care of the twins is likely to be entrusted to family members — who will be helped by lucrative media deals — possibly to a younger generation of the family such as the boys’ cousins, who are believed to be in their thirties or forties.

In Spain, where family values are important, Ms Bousada’s case provoked fresh calls last night for a legal limit on the upper age for fertility treatment. There is none at present in Spain. Nuria Terribas, from the Borja Bioethics Institute, a think-tank in Barcelona, said: “We think a limit of 45 should be established in law. Cases like this not only create physical dangers for the mother but many family complications.”

Josep Torrence, of Iglesia Plural, a progressive Catholic group, said: “The most important thing is the children are left unprotected, which should not be allowed. What is needed are stricter controls to stop this happening again.”

After the birth, Ms Bousada insisted that she did not want money for her story, preferring to guard the privacy of the twins. Weeks later she sold her story to The News of the World for an undisclosed sum, telling the paper: “I have always wanted to be a mother all my life, but I have never had the opportunity or met the right man. “My mother lived to 101 years old and I have every reason to believe longevity runs in my family.” She said she felt healthy and predicted that she would see her sons grow into adulthood.

She later told a Spanish television programme she was suffering from what was thought to be breast cancer. Ms Bousada, who insisted she had no regrets, said the drugs used during her intensive fertility treatment might have helped to spread the disease.

Her decision to give birth was condemned by Ms Bousada’s family.Manuel Bousada de Lara, 73, said: “My mother would roll in her grave if she knew what my sister has done. She would ask, ‘How’re you going to bring up two boys at your age?’”

Vicken Sahakian, the American doctor who carried out Ms Bousada’s IVF treatment, said later: “If I had known her real age I would not have treated her. She lied to me. She faked documents, knowing that my age limit for single women is 55.”

Ricardo Bousada yesterday confirmed his sister’s death but refused to disclose the exact cause. He said that to provide for the twins he had signed a deal with a Spanish television channel to tell the story of his sister’s fight against cancer.

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