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進入《TAIPEI TIMES 焦點》Almost NT$1bn project to boost birthrate
Minister of Health and Welfare Chiu Wen-ta speaks at a press conference in Taipei yesterday on a subsidy for assisted reproductive technology. Photo: Lo Pei-der, Taipei Times
By Stacy Hsu / Staff reporter
The Health Promotion Administration yesterday unveiled a long-awaited subsidy scheme for couples seeking assisted reproductive technology treatment, as part of its efforts to salvage the nation’s dismal fertility rate.
“The nation is faced with two grave challenges: a fast-aging population and a dwindling birth rate. According to the UN’s world fertility patterns report last year, Taiwan’s fertility rate ranked at the bottom among 193 nations,” Minister of Health and Welfare Chiu Wen-ta （邱文達） told a press conference in Taipei yesterday morning.
“That the nation has the most rapidly aging population and the lowest birth rate have made these issues a matter of national security,” Chiu said.
Citing government statistics, Health Promotion Administration Director Chiu Shu-ti （邱淑媞） said due to the current trend of late marriage, which is believed to worsen infertility in women, the number of children born as the result of assisted reproductive technologies has nearly tripled in the past 14 years, from 2,317 in 1998 to 5,825 in 2012.
“So it has always been our top priority to seek ways to offer reproductively challenged couples the help they need to fulfill their parenthood dreams,” Chiu Shu-ti said.
The scheme is to be implemented in three stages and have three eligibility requirements: that applicants are assessed by a medical facility to be physically and mentally fit to undergo assisted reproductive technologies; that one of the spouses is not affected by a severe genetic disorder that could increase the risk of fetal abnormalities; and that either one of the couple are still in good reproductive health and does not need a sperm or egg donation.
There are no age limits for applicants.
The first stage is scheduled to take effect earlier next year and is to cover only fertility-challenged couples from low and middle--income households, offering them a maximum subsidy of NT$100,000 （US$3,300） per year.
In the second stage, which is due to take effect in 2016, the scheme will be extended to include married couples whose combined annual earnings are below 70 percent of the country’s average annual household income, which is equivalent to about NT$770,000.
Couples whose combined annual incomes are lower than 130 percent of the national average, or about NT$1.42 million, are also to be included in the scheme after the third stage is implemented in 2017.
Due to the nation’s fiscal challenges and the increasing number of couples in need of assisted reproduction, each eligible couple will be limited to a maximum annual subsidy of NT$38,000 from 2016 onward.
The administration estimates that over the three-year span, the scheme could benefit more than 24,000 couples, result in about 4,000 babies and increase the nation’s total fertility rate from the estimated 1.055 births per woman this year to 1.1 in 2017.
Chiu Shu-ti said the subsidy scheme not only aims to boost the birth rate and reduce the financial burden of childless couples, but also to ensure that all women have a safe and healthy pregnancy.
“As in vitro fertilization is an expensive procedure, many women ask their obstetricians to insert more than two embryos into their uterus to increase their success rate, which could increase their chances of multiple births, premature labor and a number of pregnancy complications,” Chiu Shu-ti said.
The ministry said that the estimated funding of NT$940million for the project — NT$30 million in the first year, NT$350 million the second year, and NT$560 million the third year — will be sourced from tax revenues generated from cigarette consumption.
新聞來源：TAIPEI TIMES
