NHS chief warns women not to wait until 30 to have baby as country faces a fertility timebomb

[Childrenofthestones]

NHS chief warns women not to wait until 30 to have baby as country faces a fertility timebomb

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3104023/NHS-chief-warns-women-not-wait-30-baby-country-faces-fertility-timebomb.html

^One of Britain’s top NHS fertility specialists last night issued a stark warning to women: Start trying for a baby before you’re 30 – or risk never having children.

In a strongly worded letter to Education Secretary Nicky Morgan, consultant gynaecologist Professor Geeta Nargund has also demanded that teenagers are taught about the dangers of delaying parenthood, because of the spiralling cost to the taxpayer of IVF for women in their late 30s and 40s.^

Professor Nargund cites the agony of a growing number of women left childless as a key reason why fertility lessons must be included in the national curriculum.

Good advice or not?
I remember reading how chances of conceiving can drop off a cliff for some as 40 approaches but then a lot of people aren't in a position to have children in their mid to late 20s.

It was very interesting when this hit the news in Australia - because we don't have the NHS here and no free IVF, that part of the "news" was left out completely, making it sound as though Prof Nargund was basically telling women to have babies younger and not older just because.

Which, if you really read the thing, is not the point at all - or not entirely - her point, I believe, is centred around the cost to the NHS, and that if more women need IVF on the NHS then the costs of this will spiral to the point that it will detract even more from fund for other procedures.

Of course one way to deal with that is to remove NHS-funded IVF; but that then discriminates against people who can't afford the expensive procedure. So I can see her point entirely that people should try earlier, identify problems earlier and hopefully conceive without the need for IVF unless they have medical problems that are causing their infertility, in which case I'd like to think that IVF would still be available for them, at the very least at a very reduced rate if not completely free.

I think this report has been taken out of context too much and it should be brought back to the funding issue.