To think some older women having tax payers funded ivf are hypocrites?

Most trusts don’t allow for more than one cycle for older parents, so maybe £6,000 - £7,000. A single parent claiming benefits, housing support and various subsidies easily costs twice as much in just one year as one IVF cycle.

This is on top of the fact that older parents are very likely to be paying far, far more in tax every year than the cost of an IVF cycle, while teen parents tend to pay a lot less (and often nothing).

You actually have no idea why anyone needs IVF and it’s very rare for age to be the main reason but, regardless, it is true that the IVF cost is a drop in the ocean in comparison to the cost of people having children they can’t afford. (I’m aware circumstances can change but that’s not what the OP is talking about).

The existing children presumably also only exist because some “entitled” person decided to have them, so where’s your vitriol for those parents for creating the need for the state to provide for them?

The country desperately needs more young people anyway so it’s ridiculous to to say some people can’t have kids because we have to pay for other people’s existing kids. We will struggle to fund the NHS and benefits system even more if we lose the 2% of babies born as a result of IVF.

You keep banging on about being in the 60s, more childish tripe! Yes. You are bitter. The women you're bitching about having their degrees paid for instead of being teen mums aren't the graduates leaving uni struggling for jobs, they're the women who graduated 15 years ago and had successful careers before having a baby in their late thirties. They are two completely separate groups who have nothing to dow ith eachother. You can't even get your argument straight!

And I'll say it again, you keep banging on about how no one knows how teen mums are treated because they aren't one. You don't know anything about how women in their thirties having IVF are treated because you aren't one. So maybe stop spouting off your uninformed opinions. You're embarrassing yourself.

The government don't give statistics on your claims that the abortion is because they don't want kids at a specific age. You've made that bit up entirely. Much like your entire world view.

Don't worry, OP knows what everyone is talking about and everyone's opinions on everything. She is the only one with any insight in how people feel about anything though. No-one else has any clue and their own experiences are wrong.

I'm sorry people have said things like that op.

If you did not want an abortion, I am glad you were able to keep your baby, whatever your age, and it sounds as though you have done a good job parenting.

It is never fair to lump every individual in the same basket.

What I would say, however, is given many of the issues we are facing as a society - and as a planet, actually - I am not really behind this scaremongering over waiting to start a family.

There are so many children who suffer the consequences of being brought into unstable relationships that I do think waiting until the time is right is not a bad approach. And if ivf facilitates some of that caution, then I see that as a good thing, not a bad. And yes, women who grasp at any passing gent because they are 35 and panicked are as guilty of not being discerning as women who fall for some idiot in their teens that they soon part company with. But ime the vast majority of people seeking ivf are couples who are very ready to responsibly parent.

Have you considered therapy? It’s not healthy to be quoting all the random horrible people have ever said to you.

Meh.
They ARE being more responsible than the child who chooses to have a baby so not sure why the quotation marks 🤷‍♀️

No woman starts trying to conceive expecting the taxpayer to fund the conception 🙄
A teenager mother absolutely expects the taxpayer to fund her choices.

Besides, an older woman has more than likely paid into the very system she finds herself needing. She IS the taxpayer 😆

You are promoting a false equivalence fallacy. It doesn't work. It's just not hypocrisy in any way, shape or form.

Are there really that many people in their late thirties having ivf versus the ones conceiving naturally?

One of the reasons younger people don't have it as much is they think they have time - and sometimes they have just as fundamental an issue with fertility as the ones moving to address it because they are in their thirties.

@Spiderbug how many teen mums deliberately plan a baby by some noble decision to save the state money by not needing fertility treatment later on ?

Exactly. About 10% of the total budget is spent in obesity related diabetes treatment. Entirely preventable. 2.5bn on smoking related illness, 3-4bn on alcohol related treatment.

All of these things should be treated, but way to much energy devoted here to the (relatively) tiny spend of IVF.

I think assuming people leave it too late is a bit general. I wanted to wait for the right person, get married first etc. I didn't meet my now husband until I was 29. We therefore started trying at 32 once we were married with a mortgage and I then spent 10 years trying to get pregnant. I never did due to various reasons. It wasn't that I waited on purpose. Also as others mentioned I didn't feel bad accepting the IVF as I have always worked and paid into the system. I have no issues with teenage mothers either for the record, everyone should live their life for them.

The annual UK NHS budget is £242 billion. Puts IVF spend into perspective.

One round is NHS costed at between 5 and 8k, total cost to NHS is about 120-150m per year. 0.1% of the budget. For sure let’s take care of existing children, but if eligible women don’t take up IVF, that money won’t automatically flow to hungry kids. And, you might equally ask, why are people having kids they can’t take care of?

That not what I’m saying I had ivf and paid for it myself so I know exactly how expensive it is. where did I say it’s morally better ? I will say that people who just go ahead and plan kids with no housing , no job , no stable relationship shoudn’t be immune from criticism . It’s simply irresponsible and while in a lot of these cases it wasn’t planned in some cases it is . these are the selfish ones “I want a family and I don’t give a shit that I’ve no means to support the family but I’ll just bull on and expect the state to pick up the tab”. That’s the absolute height of selfishness. I don’t have anything against my taxes being spent on existing children in those circumstances, it’s not their fault but I’ve no problem with them being spent on infertile people longing to be mothers either .

It has been repeatedly pointed out that the overall provision of IVF on theNHS is not huge, one cycle in most areas and none if you are over 40. It’s a tiny part of the NHS’s overall budget. What part of that are you not getting?

It’s definitely not a gotcha, it was really depressing watching my friends miss out on things, be in short lived relationships with shitty older boys, and I missed being able to do things with my friends.

It’s amazing that you know the hidden lives and experiences of all teen mums, and all older women who have IVF. Maybe just let your own personal issues go, everyone has had some unfair commentary about something.

IVF is a LOT more expensive than you are suggesting here. It is also the epitome of entitlement to suggest that it is morally better somehow to spend public money on infertile people's desire to have a child than on actual existing children's shelter, food and so on. This just basically sums up our society: I want, I am entitled, I get and forget everyone else.

How many men do you think actively want to have children in their 20s?

Source?

I grew up in the teen pregnancy capital of Europe. About a third of the girls in my form were pregnant before or during GCSEs, and there were two girls in the year below who had left to have their babies in Yr 8. One came back. It was a national crisis at the time. AND STILL the only people I have ever heard ‘moaning’ about teenage mothers are politicians and the Daily Mail. Mostly people expressed worry or sadness. I’m not saying it doesn’t happen - everything is possible - and young mums are stigmatised and written off. But I’ve never heard an adult woman bitching about a teen mum and then going on to have IVF. And I suspect you haven’t either.

@Spiderbug you have outlined how you think university degrees are useless and how you know people who regret going. So what ? You think all women who want kids should not allow themselves a higher education or sort themselves out with housing and a stable relationship before having a baby? Yep the world would be a great place altogether if that’s what every woman who wanted to be a mother was expected to do. it would really benefit the state woudn't it ? I’m glad everything worked out for you I really am but not everyone is as lucky and that much is clear from the amount of young mothers living in homeless b&bs where I’m from