Share your views on proposed changes to fertility treatment policies in Cheshire and Merseyside

What is happening?

NHS Cheshire and Merseyside Integrated Care Board (ICB) has launched a six-week public consultation on proposed changes to local fertility treatment policies, running from 3 June to 15 July 2025. 

Currently, there are ten NHS subfertility policies being used across Cheshire and Merseyside, which means that people have varying access to NHS funded fertility treatment, depending on where they live. 

NHS Cheshire and Merseyside is proposing a new, single policy, which would mean that in the future everyone would get consistent access to fertility treatment in our area.

The new policy would include a number of changes that would remove variation, and ensure local practice is in line with national guidance, but we are also proposing to make some changes for financial reasons. 

You can find out more about this in the consultation summary booklet.

Update 06/06/25. Please note, a previous version of the consultation information and questionnaire referred to proposed changes to the requirement for IUI before IVF treatment in Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Wirral. This was an error – the actual proposed change is for the new policy to allow NHS-funded IUI for a number of specific groups across Cheshire and Merseyside, when currently it is not routinely commissioned in Wirral.

We have therefore amended the supporting information and questionnaire to reflect this. When the consultation closes and we start to look at the feedback received, we will separate out the answers to the previous version of the question, and explain how we have done this in our consultation feedback report. 

Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience or confusion – you can contact us at engagement@cheshireandmerseyside.nhs.uk if you have any questions about this.

Anyone who would like to request some help to complete the questionnaire, or to request a printed version or an alternative format or language, can do so by contacting:

Phone: 0151 295 3052 

Email: engagement@cheshireandmerseyside.nhs.uk 

Post: Engagement Team, NHS Cheshire & Merseyside, No 1 Lakeside, 920 Centre Park Square, Warrington, WA1 1QY

Communications toolkit 

Partner organisations are asked to help promote this as widely as possible – a communications toolkit is available to support this here.

Community groups or networks who would like NHS Cheshire and Merseyside to attend a meeting or event to talk about the proposal can email to request this via: engagement@cheshireandmerseyside.nhs.uk

Further supporting information

Read the new (draft) fertility policy in full.

You can view the ten existing local subfertility policies here – simply scroll to the map at the end of the page and click on the area you want to see the policy for. 

Find an Easy Read booklet containing information about the proposed changes here.

You can also read answers to frequently asked questions here.