Cutting costs: Vasectomies could soon be free across Ireland as men urged to 'step up'
Jennifer Carroll MacNeill was responding to a question by Labour's Marie Sherlock TD, who told the Dáil that it was time for men to 'step up' and stop relying on women to use contraceptives.
Responding to a parliamentary question from Ms Sherlock, Ms Carroll MacNeill agreed that there was 'significant inequity of access' to vasectomy, both geographically and based on ability to pay, and that the Government is now considering free access to vasectomies across the country. Jennifer Carroll MacNeill. Pic: Stephen Collins/ Collins Photos
She said that the Department of Health's National Sexual Health Strategy is 'committed to scoping the potential for expanding access to male and female sterilisation', including vasectomies for men.
The Minister also said that a strategy will be created 'as soon as possible in 2025.' Vasectomies are currently available without cost to some medical cardholders.
Ms Sherlock told the Dáil: 'The responsibility for family planning shouldn't just fall on the woman's shoulders. There's a simple, relatively pain-free procedure that a man recovers from within a very few short hours, but obviously it has a transformative impact on the family. Marie Sherlock. Photo: RTÉ.
'We have to make sure in the whole family planning conversation that men step up and take their responsibility seriously. There's a real inequality of access to the service, and particularly outside of the main urban areas,' she said.
'There's a crucial issue here about how we encourage and incentivise doctors to take on the service, and crucially, then from the department of health perspective, that there is a decent geographical spread of these services across the country.'
However, Aontú leader, Peadar Tóibín, last night questioned whether the Government should be offering free vasectomies while Ireland's fertility rates continue to plunge. Peadar Tóibín. Pic: Fran Veale
Mr Tóibín said: 'There are major questions in relation to where the Government is going in relation to this. So what we've seen in the last decade is a collapse in the fertility levels. They're lower now than the replacement rate, which means there's going to be significantly fewer children in future than there were in the past.'
The fertility rate for 2024 stood at 1.5, a decrease of 0.5 from the 2014 fertility rate of 2.0. This is still higher than the European average, which stands at 1.38 births per woman in the EU. In Malta, the fertility rate stands at 1.06, compared to 1.81 in Bulgaria.
Mr Tóibín warned that Ireland will create 'lopsided demographics, which means there will be fewer young people to be able to work, to provide the taxes to pay the pensions for people into the future.
'Good governance means a balanced demographics, and actually, at this moment in time, that means encouraging families to have more children.
'There's no doubt that the housing crisis is hammering families. They're delaying having children, and they're living, oftentimes, young couples in their parents' box room, which means that they can't have children and it's later and later until people are getting mortgages.'
He went on: 'The cost of childcare is prohibitive for many, many people, and also the abortion rates have increased from about 3,000 abortions a year in 2018 to spiking well over 10,000 now.'
'All of these issues are pushing down the number of children that have been born. We should be giving families the economic confidence to be able to raise their children, to be able to have children, and so that we have a vibrant society and economy into the future.'
Ryan Murphy, the operations manager at Sandyford, Dublin-based clinic Vasectomy.ie, said that vasectomies could not be accessed in multiple areas of the country, creating a 'two-tier system'.
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