4
Professional women are freezing their eggs due to a "dearth of educated men to marry", a US study has claimed.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-40504076
Yale University researchers suggested an "oversupply" of graduate women left them struggling to find a partner and "desperate" to preserve fertility.
They said the "man deficit" was worse in countries where more women were going to university, as in the UK.
The researchers interviewed 150 women who had frozen eggs, of whom 90% said they could not find a suitable partner.
Author Prof Marcia Inhorn said the research challenged perceptions that women put off having a baby so they could prioritise their job.
"Extensive media coverage suggests that educational and career ambitions are the main determinants of professional women's fertility postponement, especially as they 'lean in' to their careers," she said.
"Rather, they were desperately preserving their fertility beyond the natural end of their reproductive lives, because they were single without partners to marry."
Speaking at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology conference in Geneva, Switzerland, Prof Inhorn thought there were "not enough graduates for them".
In the majority of cases the women, who were treated at eight IVF clinics in the US and Israel and interviewed between June 2014 to August 2016, said they could not find an educated man who was willing to commit to family life.
"Women lamented the 'missing men' in their lives, viewing egg freezing as a way to buy time while on the continuing - online - search for a committed partner," Prof Inhorn said.
Bookmarks