IVF: Ealing Central and Acton
(asked on 26th June 2023) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to take steps to ensure that access to IVF is (a) fair and (b) equal in Ealing Central and Acton constituency.
Answered by
Maria Caulfield
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
Funding decisions for health services in England, including IVF, are made by Integrated care boards (ICBs) and are based on the clinical needs of their local population.
The Women’s Health Strategy was published in August 2022 and contained a number of important changes and future ambitions to improve the variations in access to NHS funded fertility services.
We will improve access to IVF by removing the additional financial burden on female same-sex couples accessing treatment. We will be working with NHS England to assess fertility provision across ICBs, with a view to removing non-clinical access criteria. We will also work with stakeholders to improve information provision on fertility and fertility treatments, including on the NHS website, and introduce greater transparency of the local provision of IVF.