Trump Administration Lowers IVF Cost; Fertility Experts Promote Natural Alternatives
Updated
On Friday, President Donald Trump and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. held a press conference to announce the administration’s efforts to lower the cost of IVF treatments while the country is facing an increase in infertility. Kennedy said the fertility rate was 3.5 out of 1,000 in the early 60s when John F. Kennedy was president, but now it has decreased to 1.6, which is below the required “replacement rate” of 2.1%.
President Trump announced that EMD Serrono, the largest fertility drug manufacturer in the world, will significantly decrease its prices, and the discounted drugs will be available online at TrumpRx. In addition, the administration plans to expand insurance coverage for fertility drugs and expedite FDA approval of Pergoveris, which is on the market in Europe.
In response to this announcement, fertility experts have expressed concerns about the safety and efficacy of IVF treatments, along with the health concerns of the children who are conceived as a product of this kind of treatment.
“Technically, IVF is experimental therapy,” said Naomi Whittaker, MD, OBGYN, minimally invasive gynecologic and restorative surgeon. “This is not something that we know the long-term health and safety outcomes of the offspring. And we know there’s a high death rate of the offspring. Starting at not only the embryo stage, but during each trimester of pregnancy, we know there’s a high loss of life of embryos and fetuses. So stillbirth is increased across every single trimester. Birth defects are increased in these children, including preterm births and cancers. The further you look at the data – three months, six months, five years – the more you find that these people have cancers as well.”
Dr. Whittaker was taught the Creighton Model FertilityCare System, which she utilizes in her practice and says is fundamental to practicing restorative reproductive medicine. This is a natural family planning method to chart cervical mucus and bleeding patterns to determine the fertile window. This method can be used for couples wanting to get pregnant and can also be used instead of birth control medication to prevent pregnancy. Dr. Whittaker said this is the single most important factor for couples who are trying to conceive.
A 2013 study found that only 12.7% of women participants could correctly identify their fertile window. An August 2025 study found that 41% of the 97,414 women trying to conceive did not know or were unsure of when their fertile window is. Dr. Whittaker said one couple experiencing 10 years of infertility started charting her cycle and conceived before needing to visit Dr. Whittaker for further assistance. The couple was experiencing severe “male factor infertility” and was told to get intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) and Intrauterine Insemination (IUI), but they didn’t need to pursue any of these options after they successfully conceived from charting her cycle.
Diet and other lifestyle factors are considered more of a “subfertility” issue, and usually these couples can conceive after a longer period of trying, Dr. Whittaker said. She said most of her clients have tried everything they can, which includes visiting multiple doctors who were unable to identify underlying conditions that are likely playing a role in fertility.
Dr. Whittaker said, “Infertility is a symptom of a serious health issue or usually multiple serious health issues. They’re often serious.” She said OBGYNs typically don’t know much about fertility. “So they might put you on three rounds of ovulation meds, then they jump you to the REI. The REI is mainly an IVF doctor. They don’t really know anything else. They don’t really do surgery.”
Dr. Whittaker explained that the serious underlying conditions that are causing infertility are often not diagnosed, which only compounds problems for both the parents and the children who are conceived through IVF treatments. Birth control can mask underlying health conditions that are often ignored by OBGYNs as patients are funnelled into IVF treatments. She says the underlying health issues persist, and cause the parents of the child conceived through IVF to have a lower life expectancy.
She said the health care system cannot handle the added pressure of putting millions of people through IVF because they are experiencing infertility. “IVF pregnancies are inherently high risk; we would basically completely collapse, I think, the maternal health care system,” Dr. Whittaker said. “We do not have the resources to take care of the high-risk pregnancies.”
Patients experiencing infertility are being pushed through a one-size-fits-all model that overlooks inherent flaws and dangers with IVF while ignoring alternatives and the underlying causes of infertility, according to Dr. Whittaker.
“The moment a girl walks into an OBGYN’s office, she will most likely be given birth control, no matter what she comes in for, even before she’s sexually active,” Dr. Whittaker said. “And it was very much pushed to me that birth control is the answer to health issues. That birth control is actually a healthier state of being than ovulation. That ovulation is a risk factor for cancer, ovarian cancer, which is really rare.”
Alana Newman, founder and host of the Speaker Salon Courage in Health Series, has been involved in multiple films about fertility. She said that the birth control pill is a “cash cow” for the pharmaceutical industry and also greatly contributes to infertility. “It’s like poisoning your reproductive organs and disabling them – like, if you paralyze your legs for 15 years and then decide you want to run a marathon,” Newman said. “There is no more powerful silver bullet to our birth rate problem than teaching women body literacy, period. My message is we need to have natural family planning, fertility awareness-based methods, and charting. And then if we do this when they’re young enough, then these women basically will never need to use hormonal birth control for the rest of their life.
In addition to infertility, an increasing number of young adults are choosing not to have children, according to a 2024 Pew Research Survey. The reasons for not having kids are to focus on other things (44%), concerns about the state of the world (38%), cost (36%), and environmental concerns (26%).