Forty years of life - the impact of assisted reproduction in Catalonia (part 2)
14/07/2024
On July 12th, 1984, the first baby was born through assisted reproduction in Barcelona and Spain, but the road to motherhood is not always as linear and easy as portrayed. Fertility treatment is becoming more common throughout the world, and in Spain, one in every ten children is born thanks to this technology. This is due to three factors: increasing infertility rates, higher age for having a first child, and access to reproductive assistance for single parents and queer couples. But despite this, it often comes with a lot of stigma, secrecy, and shame. On this week's podcast, Cillian Shields and Lea Beliaeva Bander talk to Paula, Montserrat, Marta, and Violeta, four women who have all undergone assisted reproduction in Catalonia, about the ups and downs of fertility treatment, breaking stigmas, creating new family structures and much more. The Catalan phrase of the week is "A poc a poc i amb bona lletra, " meaning that things must be done calmly and patiently to work out.