A Public Bearing

Couples feel they would like to have a child, or a number of children and raise a family. Natural enough. Enough children are brought into this world with no thought of what it takes to raise a child; pregnancies ensue frequently as a result of people having sex with no thought of the consequences when insufficient care is taken to avoid pregnancy.

These accidental births result in a myriad of scenarios, from children who are cherished and well cared for, to children whose presence is considered an unavoidable nuisance, and whose needs are neglected. Not that even planned pregnancies cannot result in children within a family having their basic needs neglected, for that too occurs.

It's infinitely more impressive when people give sound thought to having a child, and decide that they are prepared for the responsibility.

And then, sadly enough, many discover that although they feel their time has come to assume parenthood, biology deems otherwise. Their personal biology that is, when women discover that they are infertile, or when men are informed that their sperm production is faulty - or any number of reasons in between, all of which mitigate against normal conception.

There are alternative actions that can be taken, remedial physical protocols that can prove helpful. They represent costly procedures, with no guarantee of success.

Mind, there are enough men and women in secure relationships with one another who have no wish to raise a family. These couples feel their relationship with one another comprises all that they wish to be responsible for. The yearning of other couples to be able to bear children, even while their biological ability to do so has been impaired is not shared by all.

And while it is true that women; for example, with blocked fallopian tubes or other physical impediments to conceiving can be said to have a 'medical condition', and the same can be said for men with low sperm counts or an inability to produce viable sperm, their medical conditions are not such that could be construed as an impairment to their physical quality of life.

They wish to bear children, but are unable to, without the intervention of medical science.

A universal health care system is a wonderful thing. It is there to ensure that people who fall ill, who succumb to dread diseases, who suffer accidental impairment, can be given medical treatment, paid for by universal taxes through a public health program. There are countless reasons why such a universal health care system has value to a population.

Among them is not necessarily to offer childless couples the opportunity to take advantage of a costly therapeutic intervention that has a middling success rate.

Personal sacrifices are made in the process of child-bearing. Years of emotional and physical surrender to the needs of infants and children who require constant care. That kind of commitment is total - or it should be - in ensuring that children's needs are met in every conceivable way.

In the final analysis, it is true that society gains when children are raised in emotionally well-balanced homes where parents spare no efforts to give all the emotional and practical support their children require, to see them grow into responsible and emotionally mature adults.

Our social support systems aid and assist parents in their role. Through the health care system, the education system, public libraries, and public parks, along with community centres. Society does its utmost to help families raise children.

But society, through public taxes, does not have the obligation to step one: medical intervention to assist a couple toward a successful pregnancy. We have an obligation as a society to fund medically necessary health services. Full stop.