Number of women having IVF without a man rises by 35 per cent, says study

A new study now finds that more and more single women are choosing to be mothers on their own through IVF.

In fact, the number trying to start a family without a father has leapt by a third in two years.

According to recent figures, 1,272 women registered to have fertility treatment without partners in 2016, as compared to the 942 who had opted for the same in 2014.

These women, according to experts, are not necessarily career women, but could simply be people who have failed to find their Mr Right.

Interestingly, a growing number of women are opting to freeze their eggs with the most common reason being they want to put off children because they do not have any partner.

Studies show that the number of women who have registered for IVF on their own has risen 35 per cent in two years.

For the single women who want to conceive without a partner, they are required to have 12 cycles of artificial insemination before being eligible for NHS fertility treatment.

This can cost more than £10,000 as they have to pay for the donor sperm, as well as each cycle of insemination.

Given the greater bill for a single woman, many of them opt for egg sharing, in which their bill is reduced if they donate some of their eggs to another couple.

Women aged 40 to 42 make up almost one in five of those who choose to have IVF with donor sperm and with the rise in women postponing motherhood because they are single is thought to be behind rise in egg freezing.