What if AI could make IVF more affordable?
What if one of the most effective ways to increase birth rates wasn't convincing people to have more children, but helping them have the children they already want?
That’s what the findings of an international study conducted by Conceivable Life Sciences suggest.
Researchers found that cutting patients’ out-of-pocket fertility treatment costs by 50% was associated with a 2.67-fold increase in births through assisted reproductive techniques across 22 countries.
The researchers developed a new "cost-to-baby" affordability metric, estimating how much patients must pay out of pocket to achieve one live birth through assisted reproductive technology (ART).
The goal is to increase the efficiency of IVF processes by automating much of the embryology laboratory using robotics, computer vision, and AI.
Researchers identified 200 individual laboratory steps that can be optimized to free up embryologists from doing repetitive, non-value-added tasks such as:
Preparing culture dishes
Processing sperm
Finding and preparing eggs
Embryo culture and incubation
Vitrification (freezing embryos) and more.
What could a 2.67-fold increase in births through assisted reproduction mean for society?
It could mean hundreds of thousands, and ultimately millions, more families achieving the dream of parenthood over time if these findings are realized broadly.
Beyond helping individual families, more births would strengthen our communities. Over time, they would contribute to a larger working-age population, improve the balance between workers and retirees, and help ease the economic pressures created by declining birth rates.
It would also make IVF more accessible and make it possible for people to seek earlier evaluation and intervention.
But truthfully, the greatest impact would not be measured only in labor-force participation, tax revenue, or healthcare costs. It would be measured in families.
Lowering the cost of IVF wouldn't create the desire for children. It would remove one of the biggest barriers preventing people from having the children they already long for.
Creating a family shouldn’t be limited to those with the deepest pockets. Perhaps the next revolution isn't improving the science—it's about improving access.
Because hope for a family only changes lives when people can affordto reach it.
#righttoIVF
#makingIVFaffordable
