Hi Ladies
I've written the following letter, to be sent to the Population Committee. Appreciate if you can give me your feedback. I wrote this on behalf of all of us girls
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Dear Committee
We are a group of married women without kids who have struggled and suffered in silence for a long time. We don't have kids not because we don't want kids, but because conception has proved elusive.
The government is constantly advocating and imploring women to start families earlier. Implicit in their statements is the assumption that women can just get pregnant at the snap of the fingers. As soon as you stop worrying about your career, and make that decision, you'll have that baby!
Unfortunately, it doesn't quite work that way, especially for women (and men) with fertility issues and women above the age of thirty. Statistics in developed countries put this proportion at over 10% of couples trying to conceive.
Current government assistance for fertility treatments is extremely restrictive, with a cap at three treatments. Any fertility doctor would be able to tell you that it takes more than three treatments to get pregnant. For IUI (intra-uterine insemination) for example, the success rate for women above the age of 35 is 15% (25% for women below 30). This success rate is NOT cumulative.
Fertility treatment doesn't come cheap, and it often requires a prolonged course. Ovulation stimulants can retail for as much as $15 per pill (that's $150 per cycle), IUI costs $1,500, and IVF runs into the tens of thousands. That's not including consultation fees, ultrasound scans, additional hormonal injections like HSG, progesterone and FSH to support the uterine environment, TCM, and many other expensive treatments that we pay on our own tab, because we all want our little piece of happiness. I have many female friends who have spent tens of thousands on their fertility treatments, cycle after cycle, even though they have to break the bank. None of them are receiving any governmental assistance.
Please re-examine current policies towards fertility treatments. Speak to any of us, or any women undergoing fertility treatment. You will realise how little the current policies help. There is so much more the government can aid women like us and achieve its goal of higher birth rates. The current gap between what is needed and what the co-funding scheme provides for is huge.
We would like to advocate the following:
- Extend fertility coverage to first-step procedures such as super-ovulation induction and IUI
- Provide fertility coverage for men too, because half of fertility problems come from male infertility
- Remove the cap on number of fertility treatments eligible for co-funding
- Instead of co-funding, have full funding for fertility treatments
- Cover fertility treatments at private hospitals, with a cap pegged to rates at public hospitals if necessary
Too generous? Worried some women will take advantage of this? Please reconsider your assumption. Do you think we see our gynaecologist every month because we are addicted to the drugs or getting scanned? Who wants to face the risk of disappointment and heartbreak every cycle, unless you truly, desperately want that baby?
Are these not the women you should be helping?
Thank you.
Can send them thank you messages now and then.. 
