A Tax on Hope - back to the airwaves on Woman's Hour
- Hannah Vaughan Jones
- Jun 27
- 3 min read
This week I got back to my comfort zone - physically and professionally. The heatwave and record breaking temperatures in the UK meant that it wasn't necessarily an ideal time to be travelling into central London. However, I knew that at the end of that journey, there would be an air conditioned studio, a microphone and a brilliant interviewer (@BBCNuala) to make it all worthwhile. Plus of course the chance to be back broadcasting and storytelling.
The setting? BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour
The subject? IVF add-ons. These are the additional treatments that are often offered by private clinics to patients IN ADDITION to the prescribed course of treatment they are undergoing. And the addition of all that means that it costs a bomb, is laden with enormous amounts of guilt on vulnerable patients who are already feeling exploited by an under-regulated system, with wildly unknown results. The blunt truth? You pay thousands in the hope that you get maybe a 2% chance of improving your chances of getting pregnant.
Of the 10 add-ons assessed in a new study by the University of Melbourne, Lewis and I had tried 7 of them:
Acupuncture – inserting thin needles into points on the body
Corticosteroids – medication to reduce inflammation and suppress immune system activity (prednisolone in our case)
Endometrial receptivity testing - a biopsy of the uterine lining to assess gene expression patterns
Intralipid infusion - a liquid containing fats (soybean oil and egg yolk) that is administered into the blood (a literal FAT drip)
Pre-implantation genetic testing for aneuploidy - A screening test to check whether embryos have the expected number of chromosomes.
EmbryoGlue - an embryo transfer medium containing hyaluronic acid, a natural substance found in the reproductive tract which is considered important for embryo implantation. The evidence review found it may increase the probability of pregnancy and live birth, however the effect on live birth rates was not robust.
Endometrial scratching - a minor (MINOR???) procedure undertaken to scratch or disturb the lining of the uterus.
I've documented a video diary from 2017 on my Substack which is me talking in the immediate aftermath of an Endometrial Scratch ...The video is in an article titled "Forking out for the Unknown" and I'd love it if you read it/watch it and subscribe to my Substack.
From the response on Instagram, I can tell this is still a grossly exploitative industry. Not because all infertility clinics are routinely prioritising profit over patients, but because the industry needs some serious regulation. The menu of add-ons offered at gross expense, often at the worst moments in a cycle of treatment (once I had just woken from anaesthetic) feels like a TAX ON HOPE That will only come when infertility is accepted as a disease and not merely a lifestyle factor.
I've always said that while infertility might not be life threatening, it is 100% life changing. I got lucky. Yes, I was persistent and flexed every resilience muscle in my body. But the truth is there was no magic ingredient for us. It was just pure luck.
I've leaned out of the infertility forums and public speaking on this issue for the last 6 years - largely because having finally become a mum I wanted to enjoy the momentum of moving forward with life. Infertility leaves you feeling stuck, so when Sonny did come along, I didn't really want to look backwards and revisit everything we'd been through to have him. I wanted to feel normal... which is a whole other post (read: what on earth is normal?!). But now I want to dive back in and reflect on my own experience to tell the story that so many of us go through.
I'll post this blog to my Substack as well -- apparently there's some cross-pollination needed for all my content to give it the best reach. Feel VERY showy and self-indulgent, but i'm going with it... for now!
Oh and here's the clip from the interview -- probably should have put this at the top
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