Women in same-sex relationships have resorted to remortgaging their houses and sacrificing “eating and heating” to self-fund fertility treatment as the Government’s promise to equalise access remains unfulfilled, campaigners have said.– as outlined in the 2022 Women’s Health Policy – are running out of time to create the family they want.
Mrs Thorogood, 37, and her wife Stacey, 40, have had four children together, spending a total of £60,000 over 11 years and getting into large amounts of debt they are still paying off.Mrs Thorogood said LGBT Mummies received three to four calls per week from women setting up crowdfunding pages “in desperation” to help pay for fertility treatment.Lyndsay Andrews said she and her wife, from Hampshire, had to pay for fertility treatment privately, spending £30,000 in total.
This means that heterosexual couples can access NHS fertility treatment by simply saying they have been trying to conceive for two years while women in same-sex relationships must “prove” they cannot conceive by undergoing artificial insemination, campaigners say. – when sperm is directly inserted into a woman’s womb – but this must be done by a healthcare professional at a registered clinic and it can be costly if done privately.
There is currently a postcode lottery where female same-sex couples in parts of the UK have to self-fund up to 12 rounds of IUI, costing upwards of £25,000, while other Integrated Care Boards fund three cycles. “The financiers are a massive barrier for most people when they’re already struggling with the cost of living, paying their bills, paying their rent, or their mortgage,” she told“There’s also a lot of stigma,” said Ms Osborne, who has had two sons via fertility treatment with her wife.