Britons seek cheaper IVF treatment abroad

British couples are becoming "fertility tourists" and travelling to Eastern Europe for cut-price IVF treatment,but the body that regulates such treatment in this country has warned that they may be putting themselves at risk.

British couples are becoming "fertility tourists" and travelling to Eastern Europe for cut-price IVF treatment,but the body that regulates such treatment in this country has warned that they may be putting themselves at risk.

Suzi Leather, head of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, said: "I can understand why people could be tempted to go abroad, but where treatment is not regulated, there is no way that patients can be sure of safety or of the results advertised by clinics."

Dr Anders Nyobe Anderson, from the Copenhagen University Hospital, told the European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology conference in Berlin that Britain had one of the lowest rates of provision in Europe. There are 593 IVF cycles per million people in the UK, 1,122 in Slovenia, 1,133 in Sweden and 1,923 in Denmark. An IVF cycle costs about £1,500 in Slovenia and Hungary, compared with £2,000-£4,000 in Britain. Dr Anderson found that 28.4 per cent of embryo transfers led to a pregnancy in Britain; the figure in Slovenia was 36.2, in Hungary 31.9.