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Don't those people also pay their taxes then? Why should they fund old Mrs Miggins' hip operation?
Besides, do you think that maternity treatment is free?
You are talking about a cost of £80m if 70% of couples, who have IVF, use the NHS and if there is an increase in demand of 80% of current usage - at least those were the planning figures we used when access to IVF was increased to a "right" for every couple in the country to have one course.
To put it into perspective the NHS budget is £76bn - in other words about 0.1%
There is already much more than that put into "improving" the NHS, when you consider that the total budget in 1997 was about £30bn.
Oh, give over! It would be lovely if we all of us decided we'd forsake our rights (and I do think it's a right) to become [biological] parents in order to look after the world's orphaned and disadvantaged children but it ain't never gonna happen. Like it or not, we're all innately programmed to strive and want to continue our own lineage and I don't think that war/famine/neglect/previous bad parenting of millions of other children means we should all somehow feel morally obligated to give up that right - even if it is necessary to call on science for help. No way. I also don't think being obese should mean that either, though I understand the medical objections and therefore think an each case on its own merit attitude would be far more appropriate (as someone said earlier).
I see no correlation between being fat and being a bad parent. It's not ideal but we're fatter as a nation now and it's reality that there will be fat parents both naturally and with medical assistance.
You really have no idea. These people who are clamouring for IVF haven't just decided on a whim that they want a child. They may have tried to lose a "couple of pounds" as you so glibly suggest. If only life was so easy - we'd all ride to work on a sunbeam and pop out Geddes babies between breakfast and brunch. Life's a bitch, finding out you're infertile must be one of the worst experiences ever, I think we should try and help one another when science and finance afford it. They have been through (in most/all cases) years of heartbreak and disappointment so kindly shove your Marjorie Dawes schtick where the sun don't shine
I don't disagree wit hthat comment.
Nor with that one, as a generalisation. When it comes to a discussion about IVF though, I take a different view. Who are we to make moral judgements about how fit someone is to become a parent, when considering IVF - over and above the judgements we aready make. Stable relationships, certain age, been trying "naturally" for a period of time, no children already etc...
Again, this is a discussion about IVF, unless you are advicating that no-one should be allwed children until the rest of the world orphans are homed - noting your "fit to be parents" exclusion would apply there too.
Are you willing to give up the chance to have your own[i/] children?
Again, the exclusion is being based on BMI which is a poor mesaurement of weight.
Why should it be any more up to the worlds infertile couples to provide homes for the needy and unwanted than it should be for fertile couples to just carry on using contraception and adopt?
Now, surprisingly, there was something which I actually agreed with there. Spot on. However, your claim that I'm somehow attempting to make a link between weight and appropriateness to be a child is an outrageous lie.
I love you, too.
Obviously I am totally against the idea of personal responsibility :rolleyes: and not just all over your case because you think the solution to being fat and having fertility problems is to adopt a disadvantaged child. God forbid two fat people (or one fat and one thin, or one bodybuilder and a Miss World) want to spawn their own Augustus Gloop, eh. They should probably go to fat camp or start whipping up a vat of cabbage soup. ARGH. Fucking self-righteous bollocks, I can't bear it.
If you're so hot on personal responsibility then your time would be better spent whipping these existing unfit parents with a birch. Then adopting all their children.
Why not come back when you are willing to debate, rather than pick up on one comment and ignore the rest?
Me too. I don't think patronising even comes close to covering it.
It's my intention to get people debating, but not my intention to cause unnecessary offence. Briggi, if you found my reply to what you said offensive or patronising, I apologise unreservedly.
So, back to the argu... debate.
The government are not saying that there is one; the point is that if you are overweight (or indeed underweight) you will have a reduced chance of becoming pregnant through IVF, so might not get to be a parent in the first place. If you are lucky enough to get pregnant through IVF but are overweight, then there is a higher risk of complications later on.
Having a child is not a right, it is a privilege. IVF should not be available free on the NHS at all; as was pointed out earlier, worryingly we are becoming a fatter nation. Perhaps this could be one reason why there are more fertility problems in the first place, as well as increased smoking and drinking. It would be unfeasible for the NHS to provide free IVF treatment to everyone who needed it since its resources are already overstretched. Money should be directed towards averting the impending obesity crisis before trying to produce more children.
In essence it is absolutely right to insist that people are within a certain weight range before they are considered for IVF treatment, and although BMI does not necessarily reflect a person's true weight, it is the most reliable and fair way to establish suitable patients. Nothing man-made, not even contraception, is 100% reliable.
I didn't say the government did. I was picking a hole in something SG said about unfit parents and overweight people, that I partly misconstrued. I'm well aware of what the head honchos think, I'm still firm in my beliefs that it's horseshit.
As you said, BMI is a ridiculous way of judging it. Whether talking under or overweight. I'd have to laugh if I wasn't aware of all the wannabe parents who will be let down and shut out by such a way of regulating things.
See previous point about finance.
Why is it a crisis?
Except perhaps weighing them, measuring waistlines...?
Yeah, sure. Sounds like a very sensible view, and obesity levels are worrying. But is going in the direction of stopping anyone whose lifestyle is less than ideal from having IVF really the way we want to go.
Sounds to me like it's a way of weeding out unfit parents in the physical sense rather than in terms of their parenting skills. I think telling people they're too fat to reap the advantages of medical science is horrific, unless of course there is the potential for detriment to their health as in surgery etc.
Money saved on not offering IVF treatment free should be put towards tackling obesity first:
"A study by the National Audit Office in 2002 estimated the condition costs the NHS £500 million a year. The overall cost to the country is estimated at up to £7.4 billion a year."
(from http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/hottopics/obesity/index.shtml)
There clearly is an impending crisis, since three quarters of adults are overweight, and adult obesity rates have almost quadrupled in the last 25 years to 22%. Children are set to go the same way, since "10% of six year olds are obese," (same link) and the problem can only worsen since less PE and swimming lessons are offered in schools, while TV/computers and videogames are evermore accessible.
That last statistic is sickening, no child should be morbidly obese. Overfeeding your child and not teaching them healthy eating habits borders on abuse. I'm sure there are more statistics to be found, but really what is the point of producing more children who are only going to be exposed to a lifestyle which a lot of adults clearly follow, of less exercise and more consumption of fatty foods?
They're set up for a lifetime of misery, since diabetes and heart attacks are all risks associated with being overweight. And then they really will be "reaping the advantages of medical science" won't they. Telling people they're too fat is telling the truth, unpalatable as it is.
So where do you think that the extra £44bn we had this year (compared to 1997) has gone?
Although having said that I would use the word efficiently too, because being effective just means that you get the job done, doing it efficiently means that you get the job done, at the right price.
I was reading the blog of a London Ambulance worker the other day, and it' makes for interesting reading http://randomreality.blogware.com/
Interesting that you pick out the managers there and not the Gynaecologists who are still doing large numbers of hysterectomies which cost £15m, for example. Managers are an easy target.
Having said that, I can't think of a few that I know personally who shouldn't be there...
ETA: Sorry, to answer the "Can you tell me?" question, it's gone on more nurses, more doctors, better pay, reduced waiting times, more drugs, new hospitals being built (and new builds on existing ones), into private companies like BUPA/BMI/Capio to increase capacity and, of course, into increased prices from suppliers who see the NHS as a cash cow
This is an interesting one, how do we stop people going to A&E when there are other options (not fighting being one
Did you know that about 10% of the NHS budget is spent on people going into hospital via that route...
I know the blog well, there are a few others around which are good too.
Having obese children doesn't "border" on child abuse, it is child abuse. A child whose health is entirely in your hands is in a vulnerable position, a position which evidently is frquently being abused in this country.
Telling people that spending public money on them is only going to happen when they've done everything they can to help themselves, seems like an utterly sensible idea to me.
:yes:
How true, emotion and reason don't necessarily mix well.
(although for what it's worth I agree with your views)
:yes: Prevention is always better than cure.
About time for some hard-hitting public health campaigns.