According to the Federal Statistics Office, the number of couples accessing in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatment in Switzerland is decreasing but more and more women are travelling abroad “to countries that are more liberal than Switzerland”.
The data published on 2 September showed that, “in 2013, 6,180 women were treated, i.e. 140 less than the previous year“. Thus, since 2010, there has been “a constant decline in the cases of medically assisted procreation“.
If couples travel to other countries it is because Swiss legislation governing MAP is too restrictive, just like France and Germany, explained Christian De Geyter, President of the Swiss Society for Reproductive Medicine. According to him, “the number of new treatments will increase in Switzerland when the country modernises its legislation and increases the number of embryos to be developed for in-vitro fertilisation. Current limits are set at three.” If the new legislation is adopted by Parliament, this limit could be increased to twelve or dropped altogether.
arcinfo.ch 02/09/2014