International Women’s Day

Lord Winston Excerpts

Thursday 11th March 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Winston (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I do not deserve that very kind mention—even a remote mention—by either of the noble Baronesses, Lady Falkner or Lady Nicholson. In that debate last week I declared an interest in the Genesis Research Trust, which I am very fortunate to chair. It is a large research organisation that looks at the problems that women face related to reproduction.

I want to draw attention to women who miscarry. Some 880,000 babies are lost by miscarriage annually in the United Kingdom alone. This loss of life within has an impact that is much more serious than is generally understood. There is no funeral. Nobody refers to it or talks about it. Years ago, I remember just how frightened we were when my wife had a small bleed during pregnancy. Fortunately, the baby was safe. Often, women are admitted to hospital, where everybody is preoccupied with a more important medical condition. They are given an anaesthetic, the uterus is scraped out by a junior doctor and, because they are not “urgent” and are usually at the end of a long waiting list, they are alone and starved a long time. Then, sad and worried, they are released from hospital without explanation and told to try again, with no understanding of what has happened and no tests to see what is wrong. So often, I am afraid, general practitioners do not pay enough attention to this very common condition—some, of course, do, but many do not. This, of course, has been a problem during the pandemic, as some women who are greatly worried about their pregnancy get little information about the virus and whether it might affect their baby.

Furthermore, there is an issue with repeated miscarriage. This is more common when people are infertile. So often, little or no serious attempt at a diagnosis is made. Such women have a diagnosis attached to them of “unexplained infertility”, which, of course, is an excuse for no diagnosis at all. This leaves, at best, treatments such as IVF without a diagnosis. As good doctors affirm, treatment without a diagnosis, and no attempt to make one, is or leads to bad medicine. Because miscarriage is so common, pregnant women miscarrying are often treated with what seems like indifference.

All this increases the drive for them to seek private in vitro fertilisation. What women are never told is that even after six cycles of treatment by expensive IVF, the figures show that only 43% of women have a live baby—something never mentioned by the HFEA. That is after six cycles, and they may have had more than one miscarriage during that treatment.

Of course, the pandemic has had another effect. One in 10 couples suffer from infertility, and this is much more likely over the age of 38. Virtually all fertility treatment has been halted and IVF has been impossible in most cases. A crucial year has been lost. As they age, these women face a rapidly decreasing chance of having a baby.

I have great respect for the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, so it is a pleasure to pay her this tiny compliment. I think that the pandemic offers a real opportunity. When we revisit the structure of the NHS, as has been promised, may we learn from the pandemic and may the Government give much more consideration to the problems—these common, apparently trivial problems—that I emphasised. In view of the extra money that she announced for research, how much will be earmarked for diseases that women commonly experience during pregnancy?