An NHS in crisis shouldn’t be freezing eggs for free

As a fully paid-up hypochondriac, if I could I’d be at the GP surgery as much as possible – begging for referrals. But the sense of crisis surrounding the NHS – a many-sided crisis, from underfunding to short-staffing to bad organisation – generally makes me think twice. And now, in the midst of the annual winter crisis, as seemingly ritualistic as mince pies at Crimbo, I plan on steering clear unless I’m really at death’s door.

The NHS is stretched to bursting point, and I’d rather – since there’s clearly a choice – that it look after the seriously ill, the very young and the elderly instead.

Evidently not everyone feels this way about our overburdened health service. Instead, the institutional warriors of the new gender ideology – this time in the form of the British Fertility Society – are suggesting that what the NHS should really be spending money on is… egg freezing for women who are getting surgery to become men.

The new guidelines, presented at the Fertility 2018 meeting in Liverpool, called for “equity” to allow “transfolk” to freeze eggs, embryos or ovarian tissue.

The reasoning was odd to say the least: since their fertility is lost due to an NHS treatment (gender reassignment – available on the NHS since 1999), women who get surgery to become men on the NHS should also be given free fertility treatment.

Err, I’m sorry, but a publicly-funded health system that can’t even manage its A&E departments and is cancelling non-urgent operations left and right should not be spending its money on fertility treatment for would-be men (egg freezing done privately costs about £10,000 for three rounds).

Gender dysphoria is a serious condition and must be taken as such. But good and proper care for those who feel trapped in the wrong body does not need to have bells, whistles and frills attached.

Free egg freezing for women becoming men is just that.