Why Viktor Orbán’s dystopian fertility policies could come to Britain |
Youthful readers! Are you on the point of turning 29? Still able to get through Sunday lunch with the parents without an emergency call to the therapist? Strangely sanguine despite your absence from the Forbes 30 Under 30 list? Saddled with an inexplicable sense that your life is still on track?
The French government is here to change all that. As part of the nation’s 16-point national fertility plan, the Ministry of Health is to write to all 29-year-olds, male and female, to remind you that you might want to think about having children before it’s too late. Tick-tock, or as our French cousins prefer to say, Tic-Tac.
To be fair to the French government – headed by Emmanuel Macron (personal Macron progeny: Zero) – they are offering some practical help. Their advice targets 29-year-olds because this is the age at which French women can freeze their eggs without a medical certificate. French women are supported to have eggs frozen free of charge anytime between the ages of 29 to 37, which given the thousands of pounds spent by British women seeking this service, is game-changing.
Egg-freezing has been a revolutionary aid to 21st-century family planning, and many British women will be profoundly envious of the free services offered to their French counterparts. Its primary function, however, is simply to delay the crunch point at women are forced to decide if they really want children, or if they plan to remain child-free for life.
France, like all European nations, is anxious about how to maintain its population in the face of a dramatic decline in fertility. (This week’s headlines are the latest political repercussions of a shock report at the........