Benefits of IVF treatment outweigh costs, study says

PRAGUE - The benefits of providing free fertility treatments to couples in Britain could far outweigh the costs to the government, according to new research reported on Tuesday.

Professor William Ledger, a fertility expert at the University of Sheffield in England, looked at the average cost of producing a baby through in-vitro fertilisation and the benefit to the government over the person's lifetime.

He and a group of mathematicians and economists used a modelling exercise and calculated that for the average £13,000 ($39,393.93) it costs to produce a child through in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) the government would recoup £143,000 in taxes alone.

"Helping people with infertility have children is not just a benefit to themselves and their families but also to society," he told a news conference.

"Overall there is a huge net positive benefit to society over that child's lifetime," he added.

The availability of government-funded fertility treatment varies across Britain. Ledger said it was currently less than one treatment per eligible infertile couple.

But if it is increased to three treatments per couple, over the next two to three years the number of babies born through IVF could increase by 10,000.

"The average person over a lifetime will contribute 143,000 pounds to the state in benefits if they are an IVF child born to a mother of age 35," he explained.

In 2006 in Britain a live birth happens in about one treatment cycle in four.

Almost 6000 researchers, scientists and fertility experts are attending the four-day European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology meeting.

- REUTERS