Many see IVF on the NHS as a right
Filed under: IVF — Alan @ 2:48 pm
Women over forty may now be able to seek IVF treatments on the NHS; the organization has taken this decision in order to avoid being sued for ‘age discrimination’ according to new reports.
There is a difference between procedures that are life enhancing and those that are life saving, which most parents seemed to recognize until recently, but now the greedy IVF industry has turned parents into comparing infertility with cancer.
At one time, infertility was referred to as an unfortunate occurrence, but now it is seen as a disease, which means that instead of being perceived as something out of one’s control, it is seen as something that with enough money and technology can be addressed.
As a result, IVF is fostering false hopes, with many clinics promising that conception can be achieved one out of every three times, but the national average is actually quite a bit lower.
The IVF debate has also created a new issue of entitlement as people now think of a child as a right instead of a blessing and as many couples now feel that it is their right to have a child the same as it is their right to live the NHS must provide treatments.
Roughly translated, this means that one in seven couples that face infertility are entitled to receive treatment that costs £2000 a cycle, and usually takes at least three cycles before conception is achieved.
Cynics are raising questions given that the NHS is supposed to help prevent premature death and illness, but the fact that the trusts turns down cancer drugs requests that are too expensive it seems that its focus may be misaligned.
Soon couples who undergo IVF may be facing stiffer bills after European regulators declared that between treatment cycles couples should be screened for diseases.