No country resorts to IVF more than Japan—or has less success
By The Economist,
The Economist
| 05. 26. 2018
The sterile façade of Kato Ladies Clinic gives little hint of the fecundity inside. Nestling among a plantation of high-rises in a business district of Tokyo, the clinic implants fertilised eggs in an average of 75 women a day. That makes it one of the busiest fertility hospitals in the world, says Keiichi Kato, the medical director.
Japan has come a long way since journalists were warned off the taboo story of Princess Masako’s visits to fertility clinics 20 years ago. The wife of the crown prince, then in her late thirties, was being nudged to produce an heir to the throne (in the end, she disappointed traditionalists by having a girl). Today Japan has less than half America’s population, but more than a third more hospitals and clinics that offer fertility treatment. Over 50,000 babies were born last year with the help of in vitro fertilisation (IVF)—5% of all births.
Nearly a fifth of Japanese couples struggle to have children, says the health ministry. Women are postponing marriage; social pressures mean there are far fewer babies born out of...
Related Articles
By Editorial Staff, The Lancet | 07.20.2024
Image by DrKontogianniIVF from Wikimedia Commons
Despite major advances in securing sexual and reproductive rights globally, one aspect is continually neglected: infertility. Evolving gender norms and financial precariousness have led to delayed childbearing, which increases infertility in both males and...
By Staff, AP-NORC | 07.12.2024
Image by Dr. Jayesh Amin from Wikimedia Commons licensed under CC by-SA 3.0
Most adults support protecting access to in vitro fertilization, or IVF, a type of fertility treatment where eggs are combined with sperm outside the body in a...
By Julia Black and Margaux MacColl, The Information [cites CGS' Katie Hasson] | 07.19.2024
When venture capitalist Jack Abraham first began dating his wife, Gabriella Massamillo, he insisted on one condition: that when they were ready to have children, she’d be willing to conceive using in vitro fertilization. Abraham had lost both his mother...
By Eva Roytburg, Fortune | 07.11.2024