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The optimal age to freeze eggs is 19
- Teever 8mo ago> Lastly, the stem cells we're planning to use to make these eggs accrue mutations with age, and we don't currently have a good method to fix these before making them into eggs. These mutations will bring additional risk of various serious diseases, only some of which we currently have the genetic screening to detect. I've always found this one fascinating. Somehow human cells age and humans get old and die but humans can somehow make an entirely new creature through reproduction where that is reset and most of the defects from the parent are gone as well. How does that work and what stumbling blocks exist that prevent us from replicating it?
- pbh101 8mo agoIsn’t that what stem cell therapy is?
- strangefellow 8mo agoI don't know anything about this subject, but I thought it was just natural selection that effectively filtered out the 'bad eggs', as it were. On that same note, I've worried about the effects that modern medicine might have in short-circuiting evolution/natural selection. Would love to hear from someone with qualifications to speak on this matter.
- xyzzy_plugh 8mo agoModern medicine absolutely short-circuits natural selection. If you have an older sibling who was delivered via C-section chances are you wouldn't exist.
- shrubble 8mo agoThat’s not true for the USA however. The large award for a medical malpractice trial was the reason for doctors pushing for a C-section if there’s any possibility of a complication. (Sometimes called defensive medicine.) Most people point to the cases won by John Edwards, trial lawyer and vice presidential candidate as the reason for the great increase in C-sections. His case wins include 30 trials at which he won at least $1 million dollars each.
- DanielHB 8mo agoIn my generation (80s-90s) pretty much everyone in Brazil that was born in a hospital was born through C-section. Only recently did the practice of defaulting to c-section is beginning to fade.
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- rendall 8mo agoModern medicine is part and parcel of natural evolution. There is no short-circuiting of evolution. That's not a thing.
- Waterluvian 8mo agoWe’re were photocopying photocopies. But I guess if you’re taking two copies and tracing a third that is based on them but doesn’t actually have to be a facsimile, it gives nature more flexibility? Like I’m not sure it actually works this way but I can intuit why it’s possible, given the new life doesn’t have to be an exact replication.
- micromacrofoot 8mo agoNaturally the reset happens before most cells have grown, part of the trick in doing it with grown humans is doing so without destroying existing tissue or causing cancer. It's almost like trying to change the flavor of a cake after it's been baked. Significantly easier to swap out ingredients before it's that far in the process.
- colechristensen 8mo agoThere are a bunch of mechanisms in sperm/eggs for better protection/repair/removal by suicide than in any other tissue. It makes sense that these evolved to be the best in these cells compared to any other. Also other tissues might have significantly worse problems having cells kill themselves instead of continuing to operate with a corrupted genome.
- gopalv 8mo ago> Somehow human cells age and humans get old and die but humans can somehow make an entirely new creature through reproduction where that is reset I think the eggs aren't dividing as you age (you are born with them, so to speak) and the sperm is held "outside" the body. One is in original packaging and the other is produced in a "cooler" enviroment by the billions with a heavy QA failure of 99.9999%.
- vintermann 8mo agoIt's not quite reset. Harmful mutations do accumulate. Sexual reproduction is how we keep up with them - the selection effect (probably most of it at the sperm stage?) pushes it so that you're more likely to get a child with the less-damaged sides of their parents's DNA.
- nQQKTz7dm27oZ 8mo ago[dead]
- arjie 8mo agoIf you're curious what it's like for a couple of normies doing IVF, I wrote down our experience here to the degree I remembered: https://wiki.roshangeorge.dev/w/IVF https://wiki.roshangeorge.dev/w/IVF
- WarmWash 8mo agoIf I'm understanding that right, it cost $25k per run, and you did 3 runs, so $75k total? Or was it $25k for the full thing? Did insurance cover anything?
- arjie 8mo agoOur IVF clinic has a publicly available price sheet[0] so that is correct (thought he prices are higher now): $75k total for us. My wife and I are relatively old. Friends who were approximately 10 years younger collected some 50 eggs on a single cycle. There is a drop-off in egg -> embryo but the women with the 50 eggs are likely going to end up with more usable embryos than us. Insurance coverage is broader now. When we did it, we used cash pay but nowadays where we live in California there is SB 729 that means most big insurance plans will cover IVF. Personally, I think that's a bit regressive. Older, more established couples like us are benefiting from what will be primarily paid into by younger couples. But if pre-implantation testing becomes widespread (a good thing, imho) then IVF will be more widespread so perhaps this is a forward-looking policy. Still, expanding the child tax credit and raising it to 10x what it is would be good, I think. 0: https://springfertility.com/finance/ https://springfertility.com/finance/
- conductr 8mo agoDidn't read that account but I went through it with wife. The egg collecting / embryo creating process is the expensive part, so depends on how many times you have to do that process. The re-implantation was significantly cheaper, so also depends on how many times you have to do that part but at least its less costly. We ended up doing 1 extraction and 2 implantations. If I remember it was roughly ($15k-20k) then (~$5k * 2). This was about 8-9 years ago. We had no fertility issues and had other reasons for doing IVF, but if you do have fertility issues it's more risk the extraction and embryo process will fail and need repeating.
- the_real_cher 8mo agoIt's wild that in the year 2026 modern science can't recreate a SINGLE cell (which is what a human egg/ovum is).
- jokowueu 8mo agoit's possible to convert stem cells or skin cells into functional egg cells (ova) in lab settings, though the technology remains experimental and not yet ready for routine clinical use
- the_real_cher 8mo agoI'm always reading about amazing stuff like this with modern medicine. Things that work great in lab settings: cures for cancer, organ scaffolding, regrowing teeth, etc etc. Never hear about it again after the initial news.
- njarboe 8mo agoLots of tech gets discovered, is heavily patented, and then 20 years late,r when that large first round of patents expire, people start working on and developing the tech.
- bonsai_spool 8mo ago> Never hear about it again after the initial news. Perhaps it is because you're not a specialist—all of these things are still worked on.
- DANmode 8mo agoAre you looking for an explanation, or a fix, for this? (The fix is to consume less popular science types of sources.)
- greygoo222 8mo ago"Regrowing teeth" started human trials last June. Development takes time. And there is no single cure to cancer.
- yosefk 8mo agoThe optimal age to have children is way before you need to rely on frozen eggs (one reason among many being that this process doesn't always work)
- morkalork 8mo agoMy parents and my spouse's parents were all in their late 30s having children, now we're in the same position due to infertility and now finally going through IVF. We're happy it's working but at the same time it's sad knowing they'll grow up never really knowing their grandparents.
- conductr 8mo agoThe grandparent situation is sad af. It's also pretty sad being a mid-40s year old dad that doesn't have the energy to keep up with their kid. I pitched a little league game yesterday and it wiped me out. Also, the fact I (and you) will not know our grandchildren very well also is quite sad. If my son has his first kid the same age I had him, I'll be in my 80s when that kid is starting little league (or that age). Then, factor in the fact that I don't know of any men in my family that have lived past 80 and it gets really grim. They were all heavy smokers and drinkers I remind myself with fingers crossed. The most sad part for me, is I realized by delaying parenthood - I was just being selfish - and the net result is I minimized "shared time on earth" with the person I love the most. It's easy to say I wouldn't have been a good parent or I wanted X job/income first, but it's all just excuses and selfishness.
- morkalork 8mo ago>by delaying parenthood - I was just being selfish.. I minimized "shared time on earth" Exactly. My advice to anyone is not wait. If we hadn't, we would have found out sonner that we needed to go through that process. It's not a "wake up and schedule an appointment tomorrow" kind of thing, it's a treatment of last resort and you can burn years trying, going through evaluations and alternatives first.
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- SoftTalker 8mo agoIt's also the optimal age to have children. Fertility is highest, the woman is likely healthy and strong, lowest risk of complications.
- stavros 8mo agoIt's also the optimal age to not have children! You're still figuring out your life, probably no stable partner or job, time to do some stuff you'll regret later, etc.
- delfinom 8mo agoBiological optimal vs societal optimal.
- umeshunni 8mo agoI would reframe it from > Biological optimal vs societal optimal to > Biological optimal vs personal optimal
- like_any_other 8mo ago"Societal optimal" should really include consideration of whether that society can sustain itself.
- vintermann 8mo agoSure, but should "societal optimal" be a concern for the individual? I think not. Government economists, maybe.
- like_any_other 8mo agoRejecting any care or duty towards one's own society is a very modern, very extreme viewpoint. And I don't think it bodes well for societies where it prevails.
- davidelettieri 8mo agoHaving done IVF with my wife I think this is the most underrated fertility advice available today. I don't understand why governments of countries with increasing average age and low birth rate don't pay for this for all women. This is one the best pro-family policies that can be implemented.
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- CrossVR 8mo agoThat money is better invested in providing affordable family housing. Even if IVF is available no one is going to actually have kids if you do nothing to make it economically sustainable to start a family. Do we really want to rely on IVF to solve the fact that people can only afford a family home once they're well into their 40s? It's insanity if you ask me.
- Aurornis 8mo ago> This is one the best pro-family policies that can be implemented Hard disagree on that. You're coming from an angle of someone who wanted to have kids and do it in a mathematically optimal way. A lot of people see egg freezing as a way to delay having kids until they're older, which can become a disincentive to raising families when they're young and healthy enough to do it. If you want a pro-family policy, you should be spending the money on people with families and their children, not on a tool that is used to delay having children in common use. Another huge problem with this proposal is that freezing eggs is only a small part of the cost. The cost of IVF later in life could push into six figures depending on how many rounds are needed. If we're talking about pro-family policies that can cost upwards of $50,000 to $100,000 per family, there are many more effective places to spend that like on childcare options.
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- stavros 8mo agoI don't see a very big reason mentioned: You might not need it at all. Sure, the optimal age to freeze might be 19, but if 80% of women are done with children by age 30, why would you have every woman spend the equivalent of buying a small car on something they're overwhelmingly not going to need? Waiting to get a good balance of "your eggs are still reasonably healthy" and "if you haven't had kids until now, it'll probably be a while still" is probably the reason behind the current advice.
- fweimer 8mo agoApparently the harvesting procedure typically (but not always?) involves general anesthesia. That alone is never entirely risk-free. In this context, the temporary loss of bodily autonomy could be particularly problematic. All that comes on top of the required hormone treatment. It's not a trivial procedure. On the other hand, it may be a useful tool to resist expectations to become a mother until it becomes socially acceptable to say no. So it might be important even if the eggs are not getting used.
- greygoo222 8mo agoThere's no way it's a worthwhile investment to invest thousands of dollars and take on significant risk and discomfort just for a tool to "resist expectations." You should invest that in a therapist. Or moving to a different state.
- jnwatson 8mo agoThis is the best argument against early egg retrieval. If it were just a matter of money, the argument holds. However, the treatment involves pumping you with hormones that make you feel like crap the week before and after. Almost daily bloody draws are involved. Then you add potential complications from anesthesia and the egg retrieval itself, and you have a net negative expected value. The first time my wife underwent egg retrieval, the surgeon accidentally pierced her ovary. She has had pain on that ovary since.
- ido 8mo ago> if 80% of women are done with children by age 30 Is this assumption based on anything? Not saying you're wrong, after all the majority of the world's population live in poor countries where people have children younger. But at least In my social circles it'd be more accurate to say 80%+ of women start having children at age 30 (or later) then are done with it. And I know multiple women who had their first child at 40+!
- Aurornis 8mo agoThis is an article that you need to read critically, beyond the headline. Even a few paragraphs down they say this: > The optimal age to freeze eggs varies depending on the source and metric, but almost all sources agree it's sometime between 19 and 26. So there's some heavy bias inserted already into the title. The next chart shows a peak around 19, but if you read the fine print it's not a chart about eggs at all. The subtitle says it shows: > probability of getting pregnant for couples not on birth control Not the quality of eggs frozen. They're saying one thing in text and showing a chart of something else. If you can't imagine why couples in their early 20s might have a higher rate of pregnancy than couples in their 50s then you might want to think a little deeper about the factors that go into that. The writeup then goes into polygenic embryo screening, which then jumps to improving IQ by selecting embryos, which gets to their final argument which is that it's easier to collect more eggs when younger. So freezing a lot of eggs when you're younger allows for more boosting of your child's IQ through genetic screening based on a company called Herasight's data. Herasight has been widely criticized for overselling their abilities. Also, why do so many rationalist writeups end up back at a conversation about genetics and IQ?
- rsynnott 8mo agoWell, the website is called lesswrong.com, and not correct.com.
- jacquesm 8mo agoThey could have called it morewrong.com or morallywrong for all the right mathematical reasons instead. Their eugenics agenda is really more than a little bit tiresome at this point.
- Aurornis 8mo agoI tried not to comment directly on the site because I wanted my points to stand on their own. However, Lesswrong has a long history on the internet. It’s part of the “rationalist” writing sphere which has become oddly preoccupied with topics like race and IQ, eugenics-adjacent topics, and never ending flirtations with reactionary ideologies.
- tonymet 8mo agoEmployers encouraging egg freezing by offering egg freezing benefits is an abysmal conflict of interest. Employers reap tremendous medium-term benefits and the woman bears all of the long-term risks -- in this case the biggest risk of all . Employers should be required to pay for future maternity disability care insurance e.g. 2-3 years of maternal leave fully paid, elective at any time, even after they separate from the company. Also disability compensation in the event that fertility fails. e.g. $500k / missed fertility . That would reveal the true success rate of the procedure. If employers or fertility clinics believed it to be a deterministic process, the risks for the employer would be low.
- prmoustache 8mo agoSince having kids is so tiring in the early years and often lead to a divorce, it is better to have them early when you are still fresh and handle better the lack of sleep, divorce early and then enjoy part time parenthood when you are still youngish. I feel I am a better parent now that I am sharing custody of my kids and can better balance personal life and hobbies and parenthood. A cheaper option would be to find someone looking for kids with no romance and agree on having shared parenthood.
- bena 8mo agoI have to ask, what's the custody split?
- prmoustache 8mo ago50/50 The main downside is relocating is impossible until your kids reach adulthood if you want to keep it that way so that is something to consider.
- jacquesm 8mo agoThat's the main downside of divorce, not of having children or the custody split.
- kleiba 8mo agoI had my kids late in life and I always thought my life experience was a bonus when it came to raising the kids and wrt keeping it together with the wife.
- Traster 8mo agoThis article is answering a different question to what it is asking. It's asking "What is the most effective strategy to freeze your eggs if you're absolutely certain you will need to". The reason women freeze their eggs in their early 30s is because they still have a good chance for it to be effective and they now have a strong idea they'll need to. You don't have that second piece of information at age 19. Or to be specific: What is the size of the cohort of women you are expecting to freeze their eggs at the age of 19, who will use those frozen eggs. How many of them will give birth to children without the help of IVF, and how many will choose never to have children. I think this article is a good example of rationalism. Which is basically getting very mathsy about 1 specific very of the data, without viewing the data in the context of the decision that is being made. For example, what is the percentage of women you expect to freeze their eggs at age 19, who you then expect to be unable to afford the $500 every year to keep those eggs frozen over the next decade?
- whycome 8mo agoIn the year 2062, freezing of eggs is mandatory at age 19.
- iso-logi 8mo agoThis seems probable. Much like near universal consumption of birth control for woman. It's entirely a cost equation right now though. I do think its all a bit dystopian though.
- 47282847 8mo agoTo add to the additional risks and complications mentioned already in this thread: it is an open question what later life consequences IVF/ICSI has on the person born from it. Studies imply a range of health issues that may be related, even just considering effects on the mental state of the parents and their subsequent willingness/ability to emotionally bond with the child.
- nsonha 8mo agoWhy is it not "as soon as possible"?
- ml-anon 8mo agoNever has a website's title been so consistently wrong over such a large variety of subjects.
- silexia 8mo agoHow about if we change our culture to make it acceptable and praiseworthy to get married at 18 again?
- wolvoleo 8mo agoWow at 19 the last thing I was thinking about was children. In fact i didn't even finish college until 23. Didn't stop backpacking the world till 28. And never had kids at all in the end anyway, never missed them. But at 19 it would have been the last thing on my mind. Too busy studying and getting drunk (ok probably not in that order :) )