Germany is
to subsidise IVF treatment in a bid to increase the country’s extremely low
birth rate. Germany’s Family Minister, Kristina Schroder said it was “intolerable”
that couples couldn’t have children because of the high cost of IVF.

Minister Schroder said: “I find it
intolerable if the hope for children is dashed because of money. I get many
letters from couples who tell me how they scrape together the money, then
despair when it doesn’t work, and start saving again – all that with the
pressure of the biological clock ticking.”

She did not say how much money would
be committed to helping infertile couples. She also said there needed to be
increased opportunities for couples to adopt children.

The German birth rate is 1.46 which
is well below the replacement rate of 2.1 children per woman.

A number of European countries
already subsidise IVF, but according to a study by the think tank, Rand Europe,
quoted on LifeSiteNews, this does very little to increase a country’s birth
rate and may even have the opposite effect because it causes women to further
delay having their first child.

IVF works in only about one in four
cases.