In Bavaria, the co-financing for fertility treatments, which is currently suspended by the federal government, will initially be taken over by the Free State. The cabinet decided this on Tuesday, as Social Affairs Minister Ulrike Scharf (CSU) announced after the meeting in Munich.
Since November 1, 2020, Bavaria has been participating in the federal and state program to promote fertility treatments. According to your house, Bavaria will then try to get a refund from the federal government. Scharf emphasized that there had been no funding in Bavaria since October 2021 due to the lack of federal funding. The background is the exhausted federal funds. However, fresh money would not be available until the federal budget was passed. The couples who wanted a child suffered the most, said Scharf. In order to be able to support the applicants, the Free State steps in. Based on past experience, around 6,800 permits can be expected each year.
From 2023 at the latest, Bavarian couples who want to have children should be supported exclusively with state funds, including for the federal part. At the same time, the state government appealed to the federal government to increase the funds appropriately on a permanent basis. Married and unmarried couples with their main residence in Bavaria can apply for funding. The treatment must take place in Bavaria or one of the directly adjacent federal states. Sharp criticized the federal family policy massively, instead of taking care of families and children, it was ultimately only about politics for abortions, she said.
Couples receive support for the first to fourth treatment of so-called in-vitro fertilization (IVF) and intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI). The grant is up to 800 euros (IVF) or 900 euros (ICSI) for the first to third treatments and up to 1600 euros (IVF) or 1800 euros for the fourth treatment. The federal government and the Free State of Bavaria each pay half, the couple has to finance the other half themselves.