Influencers Megan and Whitney Bacon-Evans are launching a judicial review against their NHS Clinical Commissioning Group for its “discriminatory” fertility policy.
According to the couple, they must go through 12 rounds of private treatment before they can receive NHS support, while heterosexual couples have to try to conceive for two years before receiving NHS-funded treatment.
The social media stars said that they were “shocked and devastated to discover the discrimination that lesbian couples, bisexual women and individuals with wombs face in starting their family.
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) suggests women under 40 should be offered three cycles of IVF treatment on the NHS, which otherwise costs between £5,000 and £10,000 a round, if they’ve been trying to get pregnant through regular unprotected sex for two years
or have not got pregnant after 12 cycles of artificial insemination, with at least six of those using the intrauterine insemination method (IUI).
However, individual CCGs set the policy for their local area, and their criteria can vary.
The couple have estimated that for a female same-sex couple or a single woman the cost of having a child is between £30,000 and £50,000 once private treatment, cost of sperm and storage is factored in.
More news from United Kingdom
