‘Everybody should be able to have a baby’: Advocates call on Alberta for public funding for families facing infertility

Patients, advocates and doctors are calling on the province to provide help for fertility treatments. CTV News Edmonton's Chelan Skulski reports.

An Alberta couple say they are lucky to have been able to afford to have a child after struggling with infertility, but they know not every family can and they’re calling on the province to help.

Currently, Alberta is the only Canadian province that does not offer some kind of financial support for people who need reproductive technology to grow their families – which is about one in six in Canada.

“That translates to over 250,000 Albertans of reproductive age,” Michelle Chidley, chair and co-founder of Fertility Alberta Advocacy and Outreach Association, said.

“And of the 13,000 that referrals that go into fertility clinics, only about 2,000 or so proceed with needed treatments,” she added.

• The information you need to know, sent directly to you: Download the CTV News App

Brendan Clauson and Kristan Marchak have been together for 21 years and started trying for a baby five years ago.

They struggled to conceive and would both later be diagnosed with fertility-related issues. After years of trying, and testing and waiting for specialists, they began in vitro fertilization (IVF).

“It does feel like doors are closing, left, right and center. There are moments where you question if you’ll ever become a parent and that’s hard to struggle with,” Marchak said.

The couple would go through five cycles of IVF – each costing about $25,000 with the additional treatments they needed.

Marchak’s employer provided some coverage but the rest was paid out of pocket.

They said it’s “incredibly frustrating” that Alberta offers no coverage for families needing IVF or other specialized fertility treatments.

“It wasn’t a choice,” Marchak said. “It wasn’t because we delayed child bearing and that kind of thing. We both have medical conditions related to this and that’s a big struggle to accept that.”

“People who undergo these procedures and undergo this treatment are not doing it because it’s their choice,” Clauson said. “It’s not because they want to do it.

“It’s because that’s the only way they’re going to be parents.”

‘A huge barrier’

All other nine Canadian provinces and the Yukon now offer financial support for families facing infertility. Programs include funding for IVF cycles or intrauterine insemination, fertility treatment tax credits or coverage for travel expenses while seeking fertility treatment.

Nunavut, The Northwest Territories and Alberta do not.

In a statement, the Health Minister’s office said Alberta’s public health care does pay for medical consultations, referrals and lab services needed to diagnose infertility. It also covers treatments like surgeries for the reproductive system to treat physiological causes of infertility.

However, it does not cover any assisted reproductive technologies like IVF or insemination, services like egg or sperm freezing or surrogacy costs.

Dr. Ariana Daniel from the Alberta Reproductive Centre said those treatments help not only the one-in-six Albertans facing infertility, but other groups who need help growing their family.

Those can include cancer patients looking to preserve fertility during treatment, people who choose to parent a child by themselves or LGBTQ2S+ families.

Daniel said the often out-of-reach costs of those services can price many Albertans out of having a family.

She points to a 2023 study by Fertility Alberta, which showed 74 per cent of people don’t go through with needed fertility treatment due costs, which can range between $10,000 and $50,000.

Nearly half the people who did pursue treatment needed to take out loans, and 96 per cent of those who didn’t said provincial financial assistance could have helped them move forward.

“We think everybody should be able to have a baby,” Daniel said. “I think it’s horrible that access to treatment and the cost of treatment can be such a huge barrier for people.”

“I fear that we’re creating a system where only those who have money can afford to have their families,” Chidley said. “Those who can’t afford these treatments are without hope of having the family that they dreamed of.”

‘We were fortunate’

Clauson and Marchak, after five years, are now expecting a baby in July. They called it a “thrilling end” to a rough journey.

They hope sharing their story will help fight the stigma around infertility and are joining advocates to call on Alberta to do more to support families facing it.

“Every single other province has some kind of support,” Caluson said. “While we were fortunate that we were in a position where we’re able to do this, there are so many families out there that I know can’t.”

“The province needs to support Albertan families and families are built in lots of different ways, and there are many people who need this kind of treatment,” Marchak added.

Chidley said the Fertility Alberta Advocacy and Outreach Association has been working with the Government of Alberta for two years on a potential Alberta-made program and she’s optimistic for the future.

“We didn’t make it into this provincial budget. We were hoping to, but we’ll keep working with the government on creating a program,” she added. “Even a little bit to start, a little bit of help – a little bit of hope for patients – would be a good start.”

Health Minister Adriana LaGrange declined an interview request from CTV News Edmonton but her office said in a statement that Alberta is “exploring the possibility of implementing a tax credit for those seeking IVF.”

“Further review and detailed economic analysis are underway to assess feasibility and associated costs,” the statement said.

The health minister’s office said it empathizes with families facing fertility-related hardships and said fertility services not covered by the Alberta Health Care Insurance Plan or a private insurer may be included when calculating medical tax credits on federal income tax returns.

More information on federal fertility treatment and surrogacy support can be found on the Government of Canada website.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Chelan Skulski