Someone in my local NHS needs to hang their head in shame!

[Engineer1]

dave_s13 said:

Kermit power said:

Why so?

Fertility treatment is one of those things that I'd put in with cosmetic surgery (other than for reconstructive reasons) where I simply cannot see one single reason why the taxpayer should be funding treatment.

It seems particularly absurd for the taxpayer to be funding fertility treatment at the same time as having to look after children in need of adoption.

Why do you think it should be funded?

Well it's not funded (in my case), so the argument is moot.

There are lots of very good reasons it should be funded, or at least subsidised. One being the people going through IVF are doing so because they desperately want a child. You then end up with a more balanced and productive human being, in theory.

Being unable to conceive breaks up marriages, causes women with "the mental" to become even more mental and is generally a very damaging psychosocial arangement.

I kind of agreed with you before I found myself in the situation of needing to go through IVF so we could have kids. The process was horrible. Young 'un is right enough though

It also cost the proce of a TVR Cerbera.

Post the question in another thread, if you dare.....

Well said Dave, IVF is cheaper than sorting out the mess that being unable to concieve makes, do you want a country where the chav's breed easily and often and the workers who miss their peak fertility working or studying struggle to concieve? I would argue that caring for 23 week babies is a bigger waste of resources as 99.9999% either end up dead before leaving hospital or need lifelong care.

[Broccers]

Our local hospital is the same.

About a year ago I visited and a cupboard in the corner of the ward I was at had a sign on it which read 'Stationary Cupboard'.

Amusingly it was still there a year later :-)

[Kermit power]

dave_s13 said:

Well it's not funded (in my case), so the argument is moot.

It might not have been funded in your case, but in 25% of cases it is, so certainly not a moot argument beyond your own personal circumstances.

dave_s13 said:

There are lots of very good reasons it should be funded, or at least subsidised. One being the people going through IVF are doing so because they desperately want a child. You then end up with a more balanced and productive human being, in theory.

Being unable to conceive breaks up marriages, causes women with "the mental" to become even more mental and is generally a very damaging psychosocial arangement.

Possibly so, but according to HEFA, the average success rate is only 1 in 5. To be specific, the latest figure I could find easily was for 2005, and IVF was successful in 21.6% of cases.

Put that another way, there's an 80% chance that the treatment won't work, so you're still going to have to deal with the fallout in those cases, but you've got less money to deal with it, because you've spent a load on the fertility treatment in the first place.

I also realise that inability to conceive can break up marriages. It did exactly that with my cousin. They had to pay for their own treatment too, so they'd wasted £10k by the time they gave up and subsequently split up.

There are also somewhere in the region of 70,000 children in care in this country. The 80% of funding spent on unsuccessful IVF treatment does no more to help them than it does the women who received the unsuccessful treatment.

[dave_s13]

I'm not getting into a debate about IVF.

Nothing you say can say will make me think you are right and the same will stand from your point of view.

Back to flappy fatty man.

In my opinion, if the folds of cutaneous extravagance are causing issues with mobility or put him at risk of trauma and or infection they he should get himslef trimmed FOC.

If it is no risk to his health and well being then maybe not. I am pretty sure the medics involved in his assessment wouldn't have made a decision without careful consideration.

[Kermit power]

dave_s13 said:

I'm not getting into a debate about IVF.

Nothing you say can say will make me think you are right and the same will stand from your point of view.

Back to flappy fatty man.

In my opinion, if the folds of cutaneous extravagance are causing issues with mobility or put him at risk of trauma and or infection they he should get himslef trimmed FOC.

If it is no risk to his health and well being then maybe not. I am pretty sure the medics involved in his assessment wouldn't have made a decision without careful consideration.

From reading the story, I wasn't sure it was the medical staff actually making the decision though.

[davepoth]

Engineer1 said:

In a situation like this the argument seems to be do I pay with money from my left hand pocket or from my right hand pocket, either way the money spent comes out of my pocket.
By that I mean if it came from the MOD or NHS budget it comes from the government and as such it seems daft not to be having the argument after the event not before.

Absolutely, we end up paying regardless. But in this case it should come out of the MOD paperclip budget, rather than NHS money, because it shouldn't have to limit the NHS.