Cordlife ordered to stop collecting new cord blood after failing to meet MOH requirements

SINGAPORE: Cordlife Group has been suspended from collecting, testing, processing or storing new cord blood from Wednesday (Nov 26).

The Ministry of Health (MOH) said in a press release that Cordlife was issued a notice of regulatory action.

Cordlife will be unable to collect new cord blood units (CBUs), and will only be permitted to maintain the storage of existing units and perform limited actions with relation to them, MOH said.

"These limited actions include facilitating the transfer of these existing CBUs to other cord blood banks, and disposal of such existing CBUs in accordance with Cordlife’s clients’ instructions."

Cordlife Group was issued a notice of intent in September to suspend its cord blood banking services for a year.

At the time, MOH said it discovered lapses during a follow-up audit on Cordlife's operations in July. These included issues in the collection, processing and testing of 160 new cord blood units since January, as well as failures in governance, incident reporting and management.

Cordlife was given 14 days to respond in writing to the notice of suspension.

After its "careful consideration" of Cordlife's response, MOH on Wednesday said it has assessed that Cordlife had not adequately addressed the concerns raised during MOH’s mid-point audit in July 2025 to continue providing its cord blood banking service in a safe, clinically and ethically appropriate manner, and would require time to satisfactorily address the outstanding issues.

"To help ensure that Cordlife continues to meet its obligations under the Healthcare Services Act and better ensure the continuity and safety of CBUs already stored with Cordlife by existing clients, MOH has decided to proceed with the regulatory action to impose additional licence conditions on Cordlife, which in effect suspends it from collecting, testing, processing and/or storing new cord blood," it said.

The conditions will be in force even if Cordlife’s licence is renewed for one year in January 2026, and until the company "demonstrates the ability to consistently meet the regulatory requirements for cord blood banking services", said MOH.

MOH also stated that it wanted Cordlife to replace its current clinical governance officer and review all laboratory records of the approximately 160 CBUs collected since January 2025.

"MOH will continue to closely supervise Cordlife’s rectification of its various lapses, and will not hesitate to take further regulatory action should further non-compliances be found."

The firm's mishandling of cord blood units came to light in November 2023, when MOH announced it was investigating the company.

Seven tanks had been exposed to temperatures above acceptable limits, with one tank containing about 2,200 cord blood units found to be non-viable, affecting at least 2,150 clients. In April last year, another 5,300 cord blood units stored in a second tank and a dry shipper were deemed non-viable. 

It was allowed to resume limited cord blood banking services in September 2024 before its licence was renewed in January this year.