Twin Peas

Kelly Damron shares experience and advice about infertility and premature Birth. In this piece she discusses an article in the Maltese press:

It seems most other countries are more advanced or at least more open to discuss the topic of infertility than we are in the USA. If you listen to the podcasts by Aaron & Malky Benedict you’ll note that the majority of the infertility news they discuss are studies based out of Europe. I found this article in MaltaToday and was nodding my head in agreement and excited to see this argument in print AND by an expert in the field, even if it’s not in the USA..

I think my favorite part of this article is this section: “But Savona Ventura notes that: “if the state hospital is already making freely available non-medically essential treatment options in other branches of medicine, then infertility management should be considered for introduction.” He also cites studies confirming that it would be financially cheaper to introduce a regulated infertility service than to be forced to care for the premature infants born from unregulated high tech infertility management.” …This is one of my arguments when I talk with people to educate them on infertility. It’s also a great argument for when your talking with someone who doesn’t want to see infertility treatments offered in their health insurance plans because it’ll increase their rates–sorry Charley, that info is misunderstood, let me educate you on the truth…!

Since I’m not a geography whiz, I had to determine just where the heck Malta was. It is an country/island in Southern Europe on the Mediterranean Sea — off the coast of South Italy. Malta has about 360,000 inhabitants between it’s two islands. There is an associate professor in Malta that recognizes the risks of triplets and quads (and twins are mentioned in the article too) and is challenging the politicians to make changes. I wish him the best of luck...

What is it going to take for change to occur in the USA? RESOLVE has the Family Building Act and has been lobbying for mandated insurance coverage, of which 15 states offer some form of fertility treatments. At what point will infertility be recognized as a disease? At what point will the insurance companies realize that caring for premature infants is a lot more expensive than infertility treatments? For those still trying to build their families, I hope its soon.