But should the NHS fund treatment?
YES
WHETHER the NHS should provide complex fertility services at a time it is very, very cash strapped is a big question.
But if we accept that the NHS should be offering IVF and other fertility treatments, then I firmly believe these services must be offered irrespective of gender.
We must not discriminate, just because someone happens to have had a sex change.
Some people will say that, by offering sperm and egg freezing to transgender people, we are mucking around with the natural order of things. But IVF itself is mucking around with the natural order of things. It is saying: ‘OK God, you stuffed the plumbing up, so we are going to sort it out. We are going to let someone conceive when nature would not let them.’
This is an issue of fairness to transgender individuals. They are not lesser people, they are just different people.
NO
AT A time when NHS authorities across the country are having to ration cataract operations, hip replacements and even hearing aids to make ends meet, should taxpayers really be asked to fund fertility treatment so men can give birth?
The NHS is does not have endless pots of cash and, with accident and emergency departments and hospitals bursting at the seams, we should stop pretending that it does.
When you go into realms like this, I am not sure why the taxpayer should be funding it.
It’s something that people could surely fund privately if they want to.
We’ve had changes in the Cancer Drugs Fund which will stop some cancer drugs being available to people on cost grounds.
I just sometimes ask if the NHS is getting its priorities right.