To wonder how, with all the funding cuts in the NHS, fertility treatment is still funded?

[Misfitless]

I know I will be flamed.

I considered name-changing, but it's cowardly, so I will take the flack.

Maybe infertility treatment has been cut, and I just haven't heard about it, but I have certainly heard that some cancer treatments have been cut.

I know it's easy for me to say, I have not had fertility issues, but I genuinely think that if I did, I wouldn't go down the route of expecting the NHS to fund it.

I am the only person on MN who feels this way/the only one who will admit it?

That sounds eminently fair thaigreen I mean its not like anyone needs more than one child.

Maternity care costs about £2,800 per birth according to a report in 2012 and if you can't afford £2,800 per child upfront then you obviously can't afford children anyway.

I like that approach.

It's question I've asked before and didn't really get a satisfactory answer to.

How many of the 'anti IVF because it costs money and children aren't a right' brigade paid to have their 'naturally' conceived children delivered privately?

The answer I got was 'it's not the same because giving birth is potentially life threatening, not having children isn't (which, as one OP up thread has stated, isn't always the case...)

But we've already established the NHS isn't just there for life threatening conditions.

So my question remains...

And by the way, as to children not being a right...

The OP upthread who asked how many people had had to seek permission from someone/get a licence before attempting to conceive has it spot on.

In China, having a child isn't an automatic right I'll agree. In the UK though?...

And by the way. I have no idea whether I'm fertile or not as I didn't attempt to have birth children - I adopted instead. I really did 'just adopt' (Just hahahahahahaha)

But I still firmly believe IVF should be funded for those couples for whom adoption isn't the right option.

kewcumber his diabetes consultant told him that. I'd be over the moon to be proved wrong, he was told in no uncertain terms that he would be knocked back as he has a "life limiting illness" and it's not fair to place children with parents who will die imminently, as clearly everyone else knows the date and time they're going to die

I don't consider his inability to grow a functioning pancreas and magically overcome type 1 diabetes a lack of "resilience" right enough.

I doubt his diabetes consultant knows anything about adoption. I know parents with MS who have been approved to adopt (twice). It would probably require more investigation at the medical stage but if he has a stable history I would be surprised if it would cause too much of a hiccup unless there are other issues as well.

My point about lacking resilience wasn't addressed to you specifically but to the comment about "hurdles", it's a common complaint about adoption and often its compared with any 16 year old being able to produce a child but some nice middle class working parents in a nice house have to jump through hoops.

But the hoops are there for good reason, I am a mature, thoughtful (I hope) well prepared parent who had (unlike most parents) a degree of training in parenting and the issues my child was likely to face. I have still struggled at times with his additional needs. And I have been lucky because unlike some, I have been able to access help for my DS which many others haven't been able to.

Infertility is just an easy, thoughtless thing to take a swipe at really isn't it? I've always though wanting treatment banned on the NHS demonstrates a paucity of imagination, empathy and intelligence and this thread has proved that in spades.

Fair point, hope you're right, she also told him he would be infertile, on dialysis and won't see 40 so there's a possibility she's jst a bit of a bitch with a penchant for popping people's bubbles

Shona I mentioned the £5k as that is what I would have to pay for one round of IVF here. My point was that comments about 'how can you afford children if you can't afford to pay for IVF' ignore the fact that people who can conceive naturally are not required to pay a lump sum up-front before they get pregnant, unlike people who have to pay for fertility treatment. I could afford to save money for maternity leave (as someone pointed out upthread, everyone has to do this), but I couldn't save enough money for maternity leave and IVF.

Those comments also ignore the fact that the costs of having a child are paid week by week/ month by month, not upfront! So it's not a true comparison.

I was the poster who mentioned licences/ permission to have a child, because it's an extrapolation of the thought that we don't have a right to have children. I think China is the only place in the world with those types of controls.

The question of whether the NHS should find three cycles of IVF for a couple who are both long-term unemployed? If we wouldn't stop them from conceiving a child naturally, we shouldn't deny them the right to IVF to have a child.

Thai your suggestion would save money and address the overpopulation issue

I have a little boy through IUI. Prior to having him we looked into adoption and were told one of us would have to change jobs into something concerned with childcare as one of us would need to work in that area to be eligible because as a childless couple we had 'no experience of childcare' which would rule us out. So to say that adoption is a serious alterative for ALL childless couples is ridiculous.

Yabu
I think if youre going to try to solve issues you should investigate/ try to understand them
You are equally immoral accepting working for nhs in role that was not needed - couldnt the money be better spent on cancer?

Im not sure its better to extend say a 70/80/90yo life should be at the expense of babies and parents next 70 yrs together
Ivf doesnt cause the funding issues in nhs - that is mainly lifestyle choices.
I would choose to not allow vistors or immigrants to use nhs for x yrs. they could be expected to take insurance out.
A true elective CS and then another for DC2 would cost maybe £10k much more than 1 round ivf.

I would restrict to 1 round fairly across country, giving everyone the investgations and a 40% chance.
Not provide ivf to single people
Limit bmi to say 25 not 30 (for the sake of success rates and the children/pregnancy)
Look at reducing age limit for treatment as the success rates are quite low, but within that i would ensure treatment, investigating etc was quicker so the cause of being older isnt the nhs.
Should those having >2 kids also feel guilty using up cancer treatment money. Must remember to tell that to all those people.
It is a waste of money to need ivf due to aging lowering fertility. We need to enable /encourage people to ttc under 30.the flip side of this is we are the first generation going to uni and growing up with effective contraception, not getting married, being able to delay children. There will be childless people who could have had them if ttc younger or had the no of kids they wanted. Hopefully next generation will be able to try younger.
It seems a choice teen pregnancy with 1000s cost to gov per yr or infertility at £5k - which would you prefer Op? We could have had a baby at 20 living at home, still at uni or unemployed. Or done what we did, waited to 29 had a house, jobs?

I might well go for baby at 20 if i had my time again, at least i would have it (or yrs to ttc and treatment) and let gov pay for us. :)
In fact a lot of infertility is unrelated to age, but would give more time to save for treatment and higher success.
I think Op you would be surprised at the no of children you know who are fertility treatment conceived... I know 9 and thats the ones i know about. Not everyone will have divuldged this personal info.
And the success rates are very basic
I know a 37/38 yo who had 2 Dc and has frosties 100% success
I had 2/3 60% success
Also several people have had natural children after fertility treatment.
What about the fact people with DC can have clomid , i think but you would deny 1 round ivf to a childless couple?
Arent even most cancers potentially lifestyle choices related, lung, alcohol, cervix, breast cancer reduced by bf and having babies. Whereas you would deny someone born with undescended testicles or who had mumps.

So if i have private ivf abroad its ok if i let them implant 3 embryos and end up with triples, quads or more. I should be entitled to bring them back for very costly nicu treatment? But as long as i paid for the treatment its ok.
Success rates arent helped by the one at a time (i was told i would only be allowed 1 embryo put back but every time had 2 as thats all there were). But it will affect some individuals chances and costs.
Infertile couples probably save gov money overall

1. some adopt
2. no need for pill/ coil/ vasectomy/tubes tied/abortion/map
3. often schooling /health costs for only 1 child (certainly cheaper than those with 2+)
4. the children are wanted to less likely to end up adopted in care themselves
5. care costs for the parents to be as they age with no children So £5k is a bargain Try focussing on getting the unhealthy 90% of the population to look after their health as noone should need a gastric band etc. and those people who have kids they dont want to look after as everything in theory takes miney away from genuinely needy nhs patients, diabetes, disabled people. Should we discourage everyone over 40 having kids due to increase DS risk?
   It would be a lot more compassionate to think of ways to help infertile people instead of saying they dont deserve help because its not serious. (To you) Also cant remember the posters name but the one with cancer who found they werent worried about having children - that is you, your choice and not right for everyone. Though i may feel (not sure as not in that position) that i might not want to risk having kids after cancer, it makes your own mortality real, worry it could come back etc. There is no reason to think ivf dc will have fertility issues, only rarely for say CF carriers. 1/10 women have pcos Lots of couples have fertility issues or even secondary infertility, it can all change in months or yrs. so unless you dont have/want children you cant really critisise those who already have enough to go through with doing the treatment. Unless youre prepared to hand us over your own kids :) The treatment is potentially life threatening GA, OHSS, then risks with twins or more

I've got cancer and have had some fertility treatment, back in the 90s, for secondary infertility. I wouldn't cut fertility treatment on the NHS leaving only the wealthy able to pay for it. Obviously decisions have to be made for all medical conditions on how much treatment is sensible. Without the treatment I had, DS2 wouldn't have existed and he will be funding the NHS through his tax and NI for another 40 years.

Adoption is not a cure for infertility. It is about finding homes for vulnerable children who need the right home for them.

And yes, I'm infertile and have received IVF on the NHS. The same NHS that caused my infertility by misdiagnosing appendicitis so it burst and nearly killed me, also leaving me infertile. I'm not sorry for receiving NHS fertility treatment, so many people told me to sue the hospital but I didn't want to as it seemed wrong.

I can't remember if it's been said but given that stats indicate younger people have more success, perhaps we need to speed up the referral process and stop making people wait so damn long for IVF. It would cost a lot less overall then.

were told one of us would have to change jobs into something concerned with childcare as one of us would need to work in that area to be eligible because as a childless couple we had 'no experience of childcare' which would rule us out.

That's odd because I was a single accountant

YABU,

My local NHS trust has suspended funding (from Nov 2014) for new fertility referrals until April 2015. They simply don't have the funds left to treat any more couples this financial year. To suggest that the NHS don't cut funding in these areas already is misguided.

The NHS is not a bottomless pit of cash, each trust has a finite amount of financial resource and manage this themselves. Therefore, different services will experience cuts in different trusts at different times.

To suggest that Fertility Treatment is of less importance and should experience further cuts shows a basis lack of understanding of the impact of infertility. And if I may say, a basic lack of understanding of how the NHS works?

MrsD I've brought it up a few times too, not to do with infertility so I'm prob guilty of some sort of MN threadjacking crime, just because I've always been interested in it, but was told it was off the table due to dh being type 1 diabetic, another poster said that's not necessarily the case so I'm glad it's been brought up as I'll look into it again. Granted I'm not infertile so not viewing it as an alternative anyway, but I've appreciated the input from people who've adopted.

Yeah I absolutely wasn't making the comparison, and I know you didn't suggest I did, just a wee apology for my tangent! As I mentioned many pages ago, I'm pregnant atm, baby has a birth defect, 50% chance of survival. If we chose to try to have another baby at any point I'd be given the option of IVF apparently to try to rule out genetic "abnormalities", even IVF isn't always as cut and dried as some posters seem to think, I'm not technically infertile, just not very good at forming healthy babies it seems, which we didn't find out until 36 weeks so not a lot we could do about it by then obviously hoping everything will be fine but the amount my baby could potentially cost the nhs in neonatal care and operations could have funded about 30 rounds of IVF so I feel a bit guilty about that!
see I have a tendency to go off on tangents, oops

I for one would love to adopt but our local SS has told us to have our one free round of IVF on the NHS first. Then take 6 months out (if unsuccessful obvs), then reapply for adoption.
They like to see that prospective adopters have exhausted their treatment options if applicable. This is fine with me, I'm not bothered about how I happen upon my family - I just want a family. If SS need to see I am serious enough about having a child that I will go through invasive treatment - then so be it. And who knows - I may be one of the 30% of people that IVF works for.
Neither option is the easy option imo. For us they seem to be going hand in hand though.

Snoop4d you have nothing to feel guilty about! I hope your beautiful girl is born with as few problems as possible

I know a couple who have adopted a little girl, they're desperate for a sibling for her but were turned down to adopt a second time. So just because you were accepted once doesn't mean you'll be accepted again. There's no chance of them at all of having biological children because the woman has a condition that means she's never had periods. I don't really know why they were turned down - I think the reasons given were because their daughter was close to starting school and it would be too disruptive for her to start school and have a new sibling to contend with. Apparently a social worker asked her a lot of questions about her condition and she ended up crying so they've told her she needs to work round her issues about her infertility first.

I know they were extremely upset that they were turned down so I don't know if they will apply to adopt again. Their daughter had a half-sibling born who they tried to adopt but that fell through too. Their daughter is happy and settled at school now but they haven't said they want to try again. Unfortunately, I get the impression they won't.