HONG KONG: A member of China’s top political advisory body said she would propose allowing unmarried women to access egg freezing as a measure to preserve their fertility after the country’s population fell last year for the first time in six decades.
Lu Weiying, a member of China’s top political advisory body, told the state backed Global Times that she would also propose including infertility treatments in the public health insurance system at the upcoming Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), which kicks off on Mar 4.
Lu, a fertility doctor in China’s southern Hainan province, said giving single women access to freezing their eggs enables them “to preserve the eggs before they pass their peak reproductive years”. “The woman still needs to get married if she wants to use her frozen eggs and get pregnant in the future,” she told the Global Times.
Currently fertility treatments such as in vitro fertilisation (IVF) and egg freezing in China are banned for unmarried women.
Lu’s recommendations come as authorities try to bolster a faltering birth rate with incentives including expanding maternity leave, financial and tax benefits for having children as well as housing subsidies.
