NHS cuts back on IVF treatment to save cash: Couples increasingly being denied fertility treatment due to cost pressures

• e-mail

IVF treatment on the NHS is being severely wound down and in some cases halted altogether, because it costs too much to provide.

Couples struggling to have children are increasingly likely to be denied NHS-funded fertility treatment as Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) are increasingly preventing funding over cost pressures.

Less than one in five areas in England are offering women three cycles of IVF, despite the recommendations of health watchdogs.

Couples struggling to have children are increasingly likely to be denied NHS-funded fertility treatment as Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) are increasingly preventing funding over cost pressures 

Mid and North East Essex became the first CCGs in the country to stop funding treatment altogether for healthy couples last month, and more are now planning to do the same.

The Basildon and Brentwood group, also in Essex, and South Norfolk are considering slashing funding from three and two IVF cycles per couple respectively to zero.

Somerset CCG has proposed to reduce funding from two cycles to one with decisions expected by January.

The groups have all cited funding pressures as the reason behind the proposed changes, with speculation that more CCGs may follow suit. 

Across England the amount local NHS groups pay to IVF clinics for a single IVF ‘cycle’ varies fivefold – from £1,300 to more than £6,000, according to responses to Freedom of Information requests 

Many prospective parents say they are effectively being subjected to a ‘postcode lottery’ in fertility treatment.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) recommends up to three cycles of IVF for women under 40 who have not conceived after two years and one cycle for some women aged between 40 and 42.

One IVF cycle results in a live birth for just under 33 per cent of women aged 35 or younger, 28 per cent of women aged 36-37 and 21 per cent of women aged 38-39, and just over one in eight women aged 40-42 will be successful. 

Having just one cycle therefore severely limits the chances of couples having children.

One IVF cycle at a private clinic costs around £5,000 and many prospective parents say they are effectively being subjected to a ‘postcode lottery’ in fertility treatment

However, new figures published today by campaign group Fertility Fairness show that just 18 per cent of CCGs provide three cycles – a drop of 6 per cent since 2013 – with fewer than one in four offering two cycles.

Fertility Fairness has written to Health minister Jane Ellison requesting a meeting to discuss the ‘urgent and worrying trend in IVF provision in England’.

Co-chairs Susan Seenan and Sarah Norcross said in their letter, seen by the Independent, that ‘IVF has long been subject to a postcode lottery but some good progress was made over the last Parliament, and at the end of 2014 every CCG in England was funding at least one cycle of IVF for the first time.

‘However, we are now witnessing a reversal of this trend… We would like to see definite action to prevent this decommissioning becoming an automatic policy change for CCGs seeking to make financial savings.’ 

Professor Geeta Nargund, lead consultant for reproductive medicine at St George’s Hospital in London and medical director of a chain of private Create IVF clinics, is pressing Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt to step in.

She wants IVF clinics to be able to charge no more than £3,000 for a round of treatment. Around two-thirds of England’s local NHS groups pay more than £3,000 per cycle at the moment. 

In a letter to Mr Hunt she wrote: ‘There is a wide disparity in the price per IVF cycle paid by NHS clinical commissioning groups in different areas. 

'The price differential is not only unjustified, but is also preventing thousands of couples every year from becoming parents.’