I read the news today oh boy! Page 828

On a totally different note, IVF treatment is proposed to be given to women over 40 -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-18143587

It's a bit of tricky one as the success rate for IVF drops considerably with age. On the one hand it's an expensive and time consuming treatment with patchy results, on the other it provides a glimmer of hope to those desperate to have children.

It also raises a number of ethical and philosophical questions - Is this the best way to spend NHS money? Is it the right of every woman to have children? Should there be a maximum age for free IVF? Is this a racist decision, because it's mainly older white women who've waited to get pregnant? If you already have one child, should you still be able to receive free treatment? What about the link between older mothers and disabled children?

Half baked, semi-mysoginistic / contradictary feminist answers on a petri dish please.

Quote: Renegade Carpark @ May 22 2012, 1:31 PM BST

On a totally different note, IVF treatment is proposed to be given to women over 40 -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-18143587

It's a bit of tricky one as the success rate for IVF drops considerably with age. On the one hand it's an expensive and time consuming treatment with patchy results, on the other it provides a glimmer of hope to those desperate to have children.

It also raises a number of ethical and philosophical questions - Is this the best way to spend NHS money? Is it the right of every woman to have children? Should there be a maximum age for free IVF? Is this a racist decision, because it's mainly older white women who've waited to get pregnant? If you already have one child, should you still be able to receive free treatment? What about the link between older mothers and disabled children?

Half baked, semi-mysoginistic / contradictary feminist answers on a petri dish please.

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There is no 'best way' to spend NHS money. Everyone will have a different view as to what is acceptable depending on what suits them.

It isn't the right of every woman, or man, to have children, because to have a right to something it must be someone's responsibility to provide it.
Therefore if you provide for some you must offer that option to all.
I don't think there should be any maximum age for IVF. I don't think people who consider themselves past a parenting age will be clamouring to demand it just because it's there. If an occasional seventy year old wants to undergo such treatment and is in good enough health to receive it then so be it.

No, it's not racist, as it is available without reference to skin colour or cultural background. This decision reflects the current society that we live in.

Personally I don't think that if one already has a child they should get free IVF treatment. But there will be reasons and experiences that need to be considered on a case-by-case basis.

Having IVF is a huge decision and hopefully all participants are informed of the increased risks of disability. But if they want a child and don't consider a disability to mean that a person is less welcome in their life, then that's up to the individual.

Quote: AJGO @ May 22 2012, 1:51 PM BST

If an occasional seventy year old wants to undergo such treatment and is in good enough health to receive it then so be it.

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Quote: Renegade Carpark @ May 22 2012, 1:31 PM BST

On a totally different note, IVF treatment is proposed to be given to women over 40

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I think it is a good idea. Especially for people who perhaps had to delay having children due to an illness or accident of some kind. The illness could be part of the reason it's now hard for them to conceive rather than their age. In some countries having had a serious illness or disability can prevent you from adopting a child- even though it doesn't mean you are incapable of raising a child.

If there's no upper age limit on men spunking into cups then there should be no age limit on helping women get pregnant either.

I doubt many women have the menopause (nature's cut off point) at 40, so I don't know why that should be the cut off point for IVF.

Quote: AJGO @ May 22 2012, 1:51 PM BST

There is no 'best way' to spend NHS money.

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Here are the IVF success rates -

32.3% for women aged under 35
27.2% for women aged between 35-37
19.2% for women aged between 38-39
12.7% for women aged between 40-42
5.1% for women aged between 43-44
1.5% for women aged 45 and over

They're not brilliant to begin with, even if you are under 35, the success rate is only about one in three. I'm not sure how much it costs to have a course of IVF treatment, but the woman quoted in the BBC article claimed she'd spent £33,000 on private clinics.

I suppose the nightmare scenario is that a single woman over 40 has several treatments until she gets pregnant, has complications during child birth due to her age, produces a severally disabled child, with a very low quality of life, that needs special equipment, care and vehicles that costs the taxpayers money, she then snuffs it before her offspring reaches 30 years of age and the state's burden increases. This is an extreme example but by no means implausible.

The cost for this one extreme example runs into the hundreds of thousands of pounds, enough to fund treatments for proper life threatening diseases, provide extra beds and cut down waiting lists. So I say again, is this the 'best' way of spending NHS money?

If they made adoption less impossible/ridiculous/terminally slow they could probably avoid a lot of NHS spending.

Quote: zooo @ May 22 2012, 2:19 PM BST

If there's no upper age limit on men spunking into cups then there should be no age limit on helping women get pregnant either.

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The problem isn't the baby gravy, it's the baby maker. Here are the stats on Downs Syndrome pregnancies and age -

The risk of having a baby with Down syndrome increases with advancing maternal age (e.g. 1 in 910 at age 30, and 1 in 28 at age 45), but where a previous pregnancy has been affected it increases further to about 1 in 200 at age 30 and 1 in 25 at age 45.

Quote: zooo @ May 22 2012, 2:23 PM BST

If they made adoption less impossible/ridiculous/terminally slow they could probably avoid a lot of NHS spending.

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I totally agree.

Bloody women, causing all these disgusting disabilities when men have carefully provided them with their precious, perfect spunk...

Quote: zooo @ May 22 2012, 2:28 PM BST

Bloody women, causing all these disgusting disabilities when men have carefully provided them with their precious, perfect spunk...

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So even knowing the statistics and the cost and totally ignoring the feminist argument that 'women aren't baby making machines', do you still think it's a good idea that the NHS is devoting extra resources to a problem that doesn't really exist?

If we were ever running short of having babies a la Children Of Men, then I'd be the first to demand IVF for everyone, but as it is, the ethnics are having twice as many children as whitey and at a younger age. So we're not short of kiddy widdys.

I don't honestly care or know enough about it to have even a meaningless discussion on a comedy forum about it.
I won't be using it. But the NHS uses money for all sorts of controversial stuff that people consider a waste. *shrug*

Quote: zooo @ May 22 2012, 2:19 PM BST

If there's no upper age limit on men spunking into cups then there should be no age limit on helping women get pregnant either.

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I think you will find that Starbucks for one have issued some policy guidelines in this matter.

Quote: zooo @ May 22 2012, 2:35 PM BST

I don't honestly care or know enough about it to have even a meaningless discussion on a comedy forum about it.

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Pah! You're no fun. You know how much I love debating the big talking points on the BCG.

My honest opinion is totally self serving, hypocritical and contradictory - I'm totally against spending this kind of money on such an ego driven and unnecessary procedure - unless it was happening to me and my wife. Then it would be completely necessary.

Quote: Marc P @ May 22 2012, 2:38 PM BST

I think you will find that Starbucks for one have issued some policy guidelines in this matter.

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Quote: Renegade Carpark @ May 22 2012, 2:40 PM BST

Pah! You're no fun. You know how much I love debating the big talking points on the BCG.

My honest opinion is totally self serving, hypocritical and contradictory - I'm totally against spending this kind of money on such an ego driven and unnecessary procedure - unless it was happening to me and my wife. Then it would be completely necessary.

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Same as most people, I imagine.