Abstract
There is much debate not only about the morality of assisted reproductive technologies (ART) but also about how they should be classified. Should ART be understood as medical treatment for a disease (infertility) or should they be relegated to boutique medicine where they are seen as elective? How we answer this question affects our thoughts about whether ART should be covered by insurance companies. Those who claim infertility is a medical disease usually advocate that ART be covered by insurance. Conversely, those who believe ART are elective procedures generally oppose insurance coverage, insisting that insurance coverage should be limited to medically necessary treatments. While the debate cannot simply be reduced to whether “real” diseases should be covered by insurance and all other conditions should not, in the minds of many, a strong connection exists between what is considered a disease and what insurance should cover.
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Acknowledgments
This research was supported by the Oncofertility Consortium NIH 8UL1DE019587, 5RL1HD058296. I would like to thank Chava Blivaiss for the research she did that informed parts of this chapter. Also, I would like to thank the Oncofertility Consortium members and the attendants of the conference “Oncofertility: Reflections from the Humanities and Social Sciences” for their valuable feedback.
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Campo-Engelstein, L. (2010). For the Sake of Consistency and Fairness: Why Insurance Companies Should Cover Fertility Preservation Treatment for Iatrogenic Infertility. In: Woodruff, T., Zoloth, L., Campo-Engelstein, L., Rodriguez, S. (eds) Oncofertility. Cancer Treatment and Research, vol 156. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-6518-9_29
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-6518-9_29
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