Private IVF clinics cost tens of thousands and people’s dreams
By Alice Clarke,
The Sydney Morning Herald
| 01. 11. 2021
A little under five years ago, my wife and I started going through the IVF process to have a child. Being the product of IVF surrogacy, donor sperm, and a mother, Maggie Kirkman, who is an expert in women’s experiences of infertility, I felt uniquely qualified for the process.
However, nothing really prepares you for the anguish of seeing a blastocyst on a screen, falling in love with it, and then feeling it die while you are pumped full of pregnancy hormones.
Going through IVF is the worst thing that has ever happened to me physically and emotionally. The financial costs made the whole thing far more stressful and limited how many attempts we could have. I know of people who have sold their houses and given up everything to pay for cycle after cycle to have the child they always dreamed of. What’s so infuriating, though, is that it absolutely does not have to be this expensive. This is what happens when medical care is run for private profit instead of public good. We laugh at Americans for thinking...
Related Articles
By Dr. Coco Newton, Progress Educational Trust | 03.30.2026
Have you ever wondered what it means to have dozens of half-siblings across the world – or to never know where half of your genetic identity comes from? A recent episode of Zembla explores the human consequences of the global...
By Rob Stein, NPR | 04.23.2026
The Food and Drug Administration approved the first gene therapy to restore hearing for people who were born deaf.
The decision, while only immediately affecting people born with a very rare form of genetic deafness, is being hailed as...
By Emily Mullin, Wired | 04.23.2026
A STARTUP OUT of Utah, Paterna Biosciences, says it has successfully grown functional human sperm in a lab and used the sperm to make visibly healthy-looking embryos. The technique could eventually help men with certain types of infertility have biological children...
By Julianna LeMieux, Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News | 04.14.2026
Twenty years ago, Sven Bocklandt, PhD, sought to create a hypoallergenic cat. He had the genetic engineering chops to do it, but the embryology was beyond his capabilities. At a small animal genetic engineering conference, known as TARC (Transgenic Animal...