Weinberg Bill Would Make It Easier For Women to Receive In-Vitro Fertilization

When and how women should be considered eligible for fertility treatments for insurance purposes is an issue before the state Legislature. Senate Democratic Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg says the current law is too restrictive in ascertaining eligibility and is invasive in how infertility is determined.

Weinberg is sponsoring a measure that she says addresses those issues. S-2867/A-4347 would expand access to in-vitro fertilization (IVF) to lesbian couples and women without partners. It would also change how infertility is defined in a way that the bill’s sponsors say would make the process less invasive.

But opponents of the measure say it amounts to a mandate that would increase the healthcare costs of both private insurers and the state. Insurance companies, business groups, and social-conservative organizations oppose it.

IVF involves joining a woman’s egg and a man’s sperm in a laboratory dish and transferring the resulting embryo to the woman’s womb. Women undergoing the process must first take a series of fertility drugs to boost their egg production.

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