§ Mr. KynochTo ask the Secretary of State for Scotland when he intends to publish the report produced by a working group of the national medical advisory committee on infertility services in Scotland; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. LangThe report is being published today and will be welcomed by all who are interested in planning and providing services to the infertile. It contains valuable guidance on good practice and on the organisation and management of infertility services at all levels of treatment. Accordingly, I have accepted, or commended to health boards, all but one of the report's recommendations which when implemented will bring much needed improvements to the services provided for childless couples. The one exception is the recommendation supporting the establishment of a centrally funded NHS service for high-tech treatments such as in-vitro fertilisation and gamete intra-fallopian tube transfer. I do not consider that these services meet the criteria for central NHS funding and have concluded that decisions on the provision of such services are a matter for individual health boards. Boards may provide or purchase high-tech assisted reproduction services from the general resources already allocated to them: as is the case for many other treatments, the judgment of the priority for these services, as compared to others, is for them to make.