Trump Proposes to Socialize IVF

Jeffrey A. Singer

On August 29, at a town hall in La Crosse, Wisconsin, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump told the audience, “I’m announcing today in a major statement that under the Trump administration, your government will pay for, or your insurance company will be mandated to pay for, all costs associated with IVF treatment.”

More than 13 percent of women and more than 11 percent of male peers in the US have fertility problems. In vitro fertilization (IVF) makes up more than 99 percent of assisted reproductive technology (ART) procedures. According to the Department of Health and Human Services, in 2021 more than 81,000 babies—2.3 percent of all those born in the US—were conceived using IVF. As more women choose to have children later in life, more are choosing IVF. In some European countries, women have used IVF to conceive 5 percent of newborns.

The price of a single IVF cycle (ovarian stimulation to egg retrieval to embryo transfer) can range from $15,000 to $30,000, depending upon the center and the medications required.

The government mandating that health insurers pay for IVF will raise premiums for all health insurance beneficiaries, regardless of age, sex, or lifestyle choices. To mitigate costs, insurers might raise deductibles and make provider networks narrower and less attractive to would-be fertility patients. Insurers would also intrude into reproductive decision-making through the authorization and approval process.

That authorization process will likely become even more inefficient and cumbersome if he forces taxpayers to pay for government-funded IVF, which Trump supports as an alternative. (Trump didn’t address the impact of such a program on the budget deficit.)

Whether indirectly, through health insurance mandates, or directly from a government program, Trump proposes to socialize IVF. For someone who has referred to Kamala Harris as “a socialist lunatic,” this is more than a little hypocritical.