The Associated Press has a dispatch from London reporting that Britain's National Health Service, which now covers up to three cycles of in-vitro fertilization for women under 40, may extend that coverage to women up to 42 years old, same-sex couples, and women facing fertility-reducing cancer treatments. What a contrast to the approach of President Obama, who wants to mandate free contraception, but whose ObamaCare makes no requirement of coverage for even a single IVF cycle, let alone three of them. I come at this from a free-market perspective that says the government should not mandate any of this, but aside from that, it is striking that America can have an immigration policy that restricts our population, a health care policy that mandates free contraception but not in-vitro fertilization, and then find it mysterious that there are not enough younger workers to sustain the Social Security and Medicare programs for the elderly.
And when some American politicians of both parties seem to prefer proposing raising taxes or cutting benefits, they get praised by the sober commentariat for their fiscal responsibility, rather than faulted for failing to deal with the entitlement issues from a pro-growth perspective.
On the other hand, maybe we Americans should be thankful that IVF is not government-paid or government-mandated, because much of the rapid technological innovation in the economy occurs in the areas with the least government involvement.
