Unhealthy people being refused IVF

[mccaugm]

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/itn/20080725/video/vuk-calls-for-the-overweight-to-be-refus-49bfa63.html

I am not sure about the overweight being refused but I do agree with smokers being refused. If people really are desperate for a child being healthy would, IMHO, be a pre-requisite to getting pregnant in the first place. Being overweight makes it more difficult to fall pregnant in the first place although I am not entirely sure why.

This may not sit well with some people but I cannot bear people smoking around children and women who smoke whilst pregnant really winds me up.

[Margaret M.]

My opinion -- if the chances of IVF being a success are comprised if one is overweight or is a smoker, it should not be provided free of charge. It should be the women's choice to stop smoking or lose the weight as the case may be, or simply pay for the procedure(s) themselves.

[teenybash]

Wonder if they will look into the drinking habits of those hoping for IVF and take that into consideration too.........bottom line is NHS can't afford the treatments that are now possible to promote life, be it IVF or otherwise. It's just another way of cutting back................................[disgust]

[TBH]

I would imagine that anybody desperate to have a child would do everything in their power to make it happen. Dieting or giving up smoking is something I am sure anyone having trouble conceiving wouldn't think twice about doing if it gave them the chance of the child they so desperately want.

[wifie]

I have to say these solutions are probably easier said than done! Can't reply for smokers cos I never have smoked. I know there will be those who disagree but being overweight can be a psychological problem and no matter how much you want that baby it will be hard and add stress to your original problem. (Go and lose some weight you fat cow and then you will conceive! Not exactly how it was put to me but pretty close! Perhaps I would not have minded so much but a friend, who I have to say was much larger than me, had just had a baby.) I believe Mccaugm that the extra fat in your body absorbs hormones and causes an imbalance. I have to say I was lucky and, after deciding that going down the route of being "helped" to conceive was not for us, my husband and I now have two lovely children. Everyone is different and there are some prefectly healthy overweight people just as there are some unhealthy normal weight people.

I don't usually vent in such a personal way on the forum but I just think it is important that people fight for their rights and don't believe all the tosh they read in the press! Yeah I know I didn't but I just couldn't hack it and as things turned out I was lucky anyhow!

[hotrod4]

Stopping some couples due to weight etc is a very slippery slope, if a woman is overweight but would make a fanstastic parent but cant get IVF, then you may get a slim women who would make a lousy mum and only wants a baby for a trophy but she would be allowed, that would be terrible.
They shouldnt be judged on their weight etc, or if thats the case what about disabilities in the family, would they screen for this as well?.
Its every womens right should she choose to have a child, I wouldnt deprive a women of this right. I dont mind my taxes being used for IVF on the NHS, good luck to them all, big ,small,skinny,tall etc.
I wouldnt discriminate against a smoker either as a very large majority stop when they become pregnant anyway and that would be all the motivation that they would need to stop.
Thank god I have never been in this situ and my heart goes out to those that are.

[Rheghead]

My opinion is that there is a commercial aspect to all the attempts at precluding of overweight and smoking patients from having IVF treatment. Clinics now publish conception rates and there is an element of competition between clinics in order to gain private IVF care for those couples who have used up their NHS attempts. Couples will always want the best chance at getting a child so they will go to the clinic which has the best rates and the clinics know this all too well and simply stopping couples who have specified lifestyles is just one measure how clinics can improve their conception rates.