Pride Angel

Hundreds of women face a postcode lottery getting NHS funding for IVF treatment because they were born without a womb and require surrogates, the Telegraph can reveal.

Women have criticised the situation saying only a 'quirk of nature' means they cannot carry their own child and if they were suffering from a different fertility problem the NHS would fund treatment.

Guidance on NHS funding for fertility treatment has been interpreted differently around the country meaning that in some places women who cannot carry their own child are funded but in others places they are not.

The guidance from the National Institute for health and Clinical Excellence states that where the reason for infertility is known patients should be fast-tracked for NHS funded treatment but it goes on to say surrogacy lies outside the remit of the guidance.

This is what primary care trusts are using to justify refusing to fund IVF treatment for women who would require the services of a surrogate.

Sabreena Mahroof, of Surrogacy UK, said in around 80 per cent of cases IVF treatment must be paid for privately because primary care trusts have refused NHS funding. But some areas will fund the IVF part of the process leaving patients to pay the surrogacy fees.

She said: "It all depends on the primary care trust. There is a real postcode lottery here. We had hoped the new Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act would clarify this situation but it has not.

"It is a real nonsense. These women are being discriminated against because they do not have a womb. Cost-wise it is no different to funding an IVF cycle where the embryo is implanted back into the same woman.

"No one is asking the NHS to fund the pregnancy expenses of the surrogate, that would be unfair.

"It is not fair that only the wealthy who can afford private IVF who can use a surrogate."

Tracey Davey, 40, from Fareham in Hampshire, has been trying to have a baby with her husband Terry, 48, for the last 12 years. She was born without a womb but produces eggs normally.

The couple have repeated been turned down for NHS funding for IVF treatment, been through appeals and have even attempted to adopt.

Eventually the couple remortgaged their home, spending £18,000 on private treatment, undergoing two cycles of IVF treatment.

Last year an embryo was implanted in a surrogate mother only for the pregnancy to fail.

The couple cannot afford to fund another cycle of treatment themselves and time is running out as a woman's age is a significant factor in IVF success.

Mrs Davey, a bank cashier, said: "I have been fighting this for the last 12 years and am angry at the way I have been treated. I did not ask to be born this way and is there was something else wrong with me my treatment would be funded.

"There are dozens of young girls in my situation and I hate to think that they will face the same thing as us.

"I feel they have put my life on hold. I was told that I could not have children when I was 16 but then in 1989 a woman became the first surrogate mother in the UK and that gave me hope. I cannot give up."

Clare Lewis, of Jones of Infertility Network UK said: “Surrogacy is a necessary treatment for those whose only chance of having a family is by this method.

"We are aware that many primary care trusts don’t fund surrogacy, probably because of concerns of legal ramifications and we would suggest that national guidance on this issue would be welcomed by the PCTs to eliminate such concerns and allow patients to access the treatment they need to have the family they so badly want.”

Dr Stuart Ward, clinical director of NHS Hampshire said: “We will fund one cycle of IVF for patients who meet the eligibility criteria. However, due to the complex legal and ethical complications that can arise with surrogacy we are unable to support fertility treatment through this route.

“If a consultant or GP feels that their patient has exceptional circumstances and should be considered for IVF treatment, even though they don’t meet the criteria, they can ask for the case to be considered through the PCT’s special referrals process.”

Current rules mean surrogate mothers can decide legally to keep the child, meaning many people still see the issue as fraught with controversey.

Around 50 successful surrogacies occur each year in Britain.

A brand new worldwide donor connection website has launched. Pride Angel is the first website of its kind to aim towards the gay and lesbian community and was founded by a lesbian couple who have first-hand experience of known donor conception.

The creators of this social networking connection site, forum and blog are also professional scientists who are committed to giving their users all the necessary health screening advice and legal contacts needed.

"Many women wish to meet the sperm donor to find out a little more about their personality and characteristics. Some women are also looking for donors who would like to have occasional contact with the child like an 'uncle figure' in their lives, without the parental or financial responsibility. Gay and lesbian couples are also increasingly considering shared co-parenting arrangements. 'We believe that whatever the level of contact, it is beneficial to the child to know of the donor's identity, this openness from the beginning often leads to more contented and well balanced children and eventually adults," said Erika, the founder of Pride Angel.

The Pride Angel connection website is a professional user-friendly site with many unique features. It allows members to add their own personal profile as a sperm donor, egg donor, co-parent or recipient, and complete an optional on-line health questionnaire. Members communicate safely through an internal messaging system by means of message credits. Users can search the site by a quick or advanced search facility enabling users to narrow down searches by choosing a preferable characteristic such as eye colour or hair colour. The site has advanced functionality to prevent donors over-contacting recipients along with email reminders of the live birth donor law within the UK. The site is also constantly monitored to ensure all members are genuine.

Due to recent law changes and the introduction of the new parenting law, lesbian couples can now both be named on the birth certificate and take equal parental responsibility. This law also means that lesbian couples in civil partnerships can use known donors and be treated using IUI (inter-uterine insemination) rather than IVF. This new law allows men to donate sperm to a couple of their choice without the worry of being held financially responsible. Gay men also have the option of having definite contact with the child if agreed between everyone involved, through legal contact orders. There are now many legal options to suit different family situations, depending on who donors donate sperm to and what level of contact with the child they wish to have.

Members are advised to use HFEA regulated fertility clinics for treatment and to gain all the right legal advice regarding setting up written donor or co-parenting agreements from fertility law specialists.

Eligible patients will be required to sign up to a health and lifestyle improvement programme including stop smoking, not drinking and losing weight if necessary before they embark on IVF treatment.

In return the Bridge clinic in central London is offering a fixed price package of treatment including optional acupuncture and a second free cycle of IVF if the first one fails.

The package will cost £4,500 and include all tests, scans, drugs, four months of folic acid supplements which women trying to conceive are advised to take, counselling and stress relief programme.

To start with only patients with a good chance of success are being offered the programme but after the result of the first 50 treatments are known it may be rolled out to more difficult cases.

Patients will be offered the programme, called IVF Plus, if the woman is under 36 and is a healthy weight, have not had a failed cycle of IVF before or a miscarriage and both partners are free of infectious diseases. If their initial tests are favourable, the contract will be signed and treatment commences.

The package will also include the more complicated method of IVF known as ICSI, where an individual sperm is injected directly into the egg, rather than being simply mixed together in a dish. This method is more often used when there are problems with the male partner's fertility and is generally more expensive.

Dr Mohamed Menabawey, medical director of the Bridge clinic, said: "It is a contract between us and the patient. The technology can go so far but the patient has to play their part.

"They have to agree to improve their lifestyle, stop smoking, stop drinking and lose weight if they need to and to undergo stress management. It is to make sure they are in the best shape they can be mentally and physically.

"We are very confident we will see good results."

He said that there is scope within the programme to tailor the treatment to the needs of the individual patients.

The clinic intends to use a similar approach for older patients who have a lower chance of success or those with more complex problems once they have the results from the first 50 couples.

The programme also fits with the fertility regulator, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, which is encouraging clinics to inform patients at the beginning of their treatment what the likely costs will be as many have seen costs spiral.

Around one in seven couples experience fertility problems and in 2006 there were 44,275 cycles of IVF carried out in England and Wales.

Between one in four and one in five cycles are successful and costs can vary from around £4,000 per cycle to more than £8,000 including drugs.

The Montana Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that a lesbian must be treated as a mother to the two children that she raised with her partner of 10 years. The ACLU, which represented the mother, applauds the decision giving children the right to maintain relationships with both their parents after a break-up.

“This is a victory for all parents and children in Montana,” said ACLU of Montana Legal Director Betsy Griffing. “The love a parent and child share is not limited by marital status or sexual orientation, and the Montana Supreme Court was right to determine that state law protects that bond.”

Although Kulstad and her partner Barbara Maniaci had raised two children together for years, Maniaci sought to deny Kulstad a relationship with the children after they split, arguing that Kulstad is not a legal parent to the children. The Montana Supreme Court sided with an earlier district court and ruled that Kulstad is a parent to the children under a Montana law that establishes parental rights for people who act as parents.

“Maniaci cannot rewrite the history of the fact that she and Kulstad lived together for more than 10 years and jointly raised the minor children in the same household,” wrote Justice Brian Morris in the court’s opinion, shared by six of the state’s seven Supreme Court justices.

The decision upholds a Montana law that recognizes parent-child relationships that arise outside of biology and adoption when certain criteria are met, including: - The person shows that he or she provided for the day-to-day physical and emotional needs of a child by providing food, shelter, clothing, care, education and discipline; - The child’s adoptive/birth parent allowed and intended for the parent-child relationship to develop; and - It is in the child’s best interests to recognize and continue the parent-child relationship.

In determining that Kulstad is a parent to the two children, the court found that Kulstad met these requirements. The court also affirmed the district court’s decision to award Kulstad a fair share of the couple’s joint property. In a concurring opinion, Justice James Nelson spoke of the difficulties gay and lesbian people in Montana face. “Sadly… this case represents yet another instance in which fellow Montanans, who happen to be lesbian or gay, are forced to battle for their fundamental rights to love who they want, to form intimate associations, to form family relationships, and to have and raise children — all elemental, natural rights that are accorded, presumptively and without thought or hesitation, to heterosexuals,” Nelson wrote. “I am convinced that until our courts, as a matter of law, accept homosexuals as equal participants with heterosexuals in our society, each person with exactly the same civil and natural rights, lesbian and gay citizens will continue to suffer homophobic discrimination.”

Lesbians are better at raising children than conventional couples, a senior member of the Government's parenting academy has said.

According to the annual British Social Attitudes Report, more than a third of people now believe same-sex parents are as good as heterosexual couples.

Stephen Scott, director of research at the National Academy for Parenting Practitioners, has said his research shows children from lesbian couples do better in life than the offspring of heterosexual couples. "Lesbians make better parents than a man and a women," Mr Scott told a meeting for the launch of think tank Demos. His controversial position draws backing from research that suggests children with two female parents are more aspirational than those with opposite-sex parents. Some studies also also shows children with lesbian parents are no more or less likely to have tendencies towards homosexuality.

Research at Birkbeck College, part of London University, and Clark University in Massachusetts suggests that same-sex couples make good parents because children cannot be conceived accidentally - parents must make an active decision to adopt or find a sperm donor. However, campaigners counter that fathers play an important part in family life and children have a right to get to know both of their biological parents.

Jon Davies, chief executive of the Families Need Fathers organisation, said: "Since all children will have a biological father the child has a right to know who that is. In most families where there will be a mother and a father, a father is needed to support them. But it is the quality of parenting that counts in the end regardless of the parents."

According to the annual British Social Attitudes Report, more than a third of people now believe same-sex parents are as good as heterosexual couples.

Sexual health charity Terrence Higgins Trust (THT) is now offering an HIV test which can be used four weeks after infection. Usually, tests can only be carried out three months after the date of suspected transmission. The blood test, which involves a finger prick, will be used at THT’s Fastest clinics and results are normally available in approximately 20 minutes. If the test result is positive, staff will advise another test is taken to confirm the diagnosis. Dr Michael Brady, medical director at THT, said “If you’re worried you’ve been exposed to HIV waiting three months for an accurate test result can be agonising. Technology has now moved on, so we’re able to offer reliable tests earlier. If you think you’ve been at risk or you’re in a high risk group you should consider getting a test. It’s quick, confidential and could put your mind at rest.” To find out if there is a Fastest clinic near you visit www.tht.org.uk/fastest or call THT Direct on 0845 12 21 200

The worlds first 'fertility show' took place this weekend at the Olympia Conference centre London. Pride Angel went to communicate with leading charities, infertility support networks and fertility clinics at the exhibition. The response to Pride Angel's new connection service was extremely positive. 'What a fantastic idea and service, we never new such a site existed for enabling sperm donors, co-parents and recipients to connect and gain the correct advice' was the response from many exhibitors.

The fertility show was a huge success, with many thousands of attendees. Seminars by leading nutritional expert Zita West where sold out well in advance. Although Pride Angel did manage to speak personally with Zita West regarding her giving advice to our members on our site in the future.

The fertility show held over 80 exhibits and 45 talks from top fertility experts. Pride Angel will soon be creating a new recommended links section connecting to many of the services and clinics offered at the fertility show. We want to help all our members by giving the right advice and the recommended contacts they need when making such an important and exciting decision to start a family.

Scientists have moved a step closer to creating human sperm and eggs from stem cells in research which could end infertility problems. Researchers at Stanford University, which harvested the stem cells from an embryo, claim the breakthrough could eventually cure infertility in men, birth defects and even extend the menopause in women. Previous studies have claimed to have reproduced egg and sperm cells in the laboratory but they were always slightly damaged or malformed. The researchers in the latest study believe their germ cells - the cells that eventually turn into sperm and eggs - are so perfect it would be possible to grow them into fully functioning reproductive cells. The scientists, who published their findings in Nature, claim to have unlocked the genetic "recipe" that leads to these unique cells being formed. They used human embryonic stem cells from excess IVF embryos and treated them with proteins to stimulate the growth of germ cells. It is estimated that one in seven couples in Britain - about 3.5 million people - have difficulty conceiving. In about a third of couples having IVF, male fertility is a contributory factor. "Figuring out the genetic 'recipe' needed to develop human germ cells in the laboratory will give us the tools we need to trace what's going wrong for these people," said Dr Renee Reijo Pera, the senior author. Eventually the researchers want to see if they can create germ cells from adult stem cells which could be harvested from any part of the body including skin. In July, the Daily Telegraph reported that a British team at the Northeast England Stem Cell Institute claimed to have become the first to create sperm in the laboratory though they admitted it was not "perfect". Researchers said that with some minor changes the sperm could theoretically fertilise an egg to create a child. Professor Karim Nayernia, a stem cell biologist who led the team, said the sperm had all the essential qualities for creating life. He said: "They have heads, they have tails and they move. The shape is not quite normal nor the movement, but they contain the proteins for egg activation.'' The team had already used the technique in mice and produced offspring, although all died shortly after they were born. Professor Nayernia added: "We hope that eventually this could help create sperm for infertile men.'' Currently the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008 bans the use of artificially created sperm and eggs in fertility treatment.

Equal rights to IVF treatment will soon be given to lesbian couples by the NHS in Scotland. Following legal action by one lesbian couple, the government has set up an advisory group which is expected to recommend early next year that lesbians should be routinely allowed access to NHS fertility services. Caroline Harris and Julie McMullan fought NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde this year for the right to free fertility treatment. The trust had argued that they did not fit the definition of an infertile couple but backed down after they threatened to sue for discrimination. The trust now allows lesbian couples to be treated for free, along with NHS Borders and NHS Highland. NHS Lothian provides donor insemination and IVF with a donor to lesbian couples on a "case by case basis". A government spokeswoman told The Times: “The current guidelines do not specifically exclude same-sex couples and we know that some NHS boards do provide infertility services to same-sex couples. “However, we realise that this is not consistent throughout Scotland and we will ask the expert group, once set up, to consider this issue.” The Scottish Catholic Church has attacked the plans for new rules. A spokesman said: “It must be galling for people who are suffering from terrible illnesses, who can’t get the treatment they need, to see a frivolous waste of money on people who have chosen a lifestyle that is incompatible with having children.” A recent Freedom of Information Act request found that lesbian women are still being denied fertility treatment. According to a survey carried out by Press Association, primary care trusts appear to be turning down lesbian couples for treatment on the grounds that funding is only available for those with fertility problems. Previously, clinics could turn down lesbians due to the "need for a father" but the law has now been changed. Out of the 152 PCTs in England, 38 responded to the survey, along with three of Scotland's 14 territorial health boards and the Health Commission Wales. None said they had given any lesbian couples NHS-funded fertility treatment, although two PCTs said they were currently considering applications from two women in same-sex relationships. Seven of those surveyed said they had rejected lesbians couples for fertility treatment. Twenty-one PCTs said they did not keep any record of sexual orientation and so could not provide any more data.