In a time when “national treasure” is a title seemingly thrown upon anyone nice and British, Sir Robert Winston has done more than perhaps anyone else to earn his label.
As a scientist, he is considered a key figure in the popularisation of IVF treatment, and a pioneer in the technology that has allowed millions of couples to have children. For his work, he has earned honorary doctorates from a staggering twenty-three universities.
For decades, Robert has also been a familiar face to Britain’s television viewers, having presented dozens of hugely popular science programmes, as well as becoming a mainstay panellist on the likes of Have I Got News For You and Question Time.
In 1995, he was made a life peer, and to this day he sits on the Labour Party benches in the House of Lords, discussing the likes of education, medicine, and the arts.
Why did we invite him on?
Throughout his career, Robert has managed to do what so often seems impossible: remain beloved while also being unafraid to speak his mind. Whether it’s the commercialisation of IVF, gender-affirming surgery, or the nature of truth itself, Robert has expressed views counter to the orthodoxy without ever straying into quackery.
For that alone, he’s an ideal Triggernometry guest.
What did we learn?
We’re all used to it now, but one mustn’t forget what a divisive practice IVF was in its early days. Working in America at the time, Robert laments the difficulties he and his team had in their efforts to secure funding, with many institutions deeming it “disgraceful”, a barbaric act of playing God.
”We’re [allegedly] creating human life. We’re not; a sperm and an egg are already alive. Most embryos don’t even implant properly, and many of which do also miscarry, sometimes without the mother noticing. Nature itself does not respect the human embryo as sacrosanct. My view depends on ‘When can you see life really developing?’ To me, that’s consciousness, or the beginning of the nervous system - the 14-day limit. Thomas Aquinas had something similar in the 15th century, and many Christians didn’t like my pointing that out.”
To many, science and religion are natural adversaries. One disproves the other at every turn, and the two cannot coexist in the mind of any rational thinker. Robert dismisses this notion. In fact, the two are more alike than they are different.
”Science and religion are very similar. We do both because we’re uncertain, and uncertainty is part of a basic human need. We need to find certainty, but certainty is dangerous, and it’s just as dangerous in religion as it is science.”
This initial controversy could percolate because, at the time Robert was helping to advance the field of IVF, the practice still was a rare one - one only used in specific, unorthodox cases. Decades later, IVF has become an increasingly large part of the public conscience. As more and more couples delay childbirth into their 30s, more are also resorting to the procedure. As Francis points out, it’s become a “very mainstream industry”.
As a pioneer, he must be thrilled.
He isn’t.
”I’m very disappointed. I don’t want to sound like a saint, because I’m not… But in my group, we all agreed to take very modest incomes, and that we wouldn’t charge private fees. Any fees we received from, say, international patients, were pooled and added to the research pot - The Genesis Research Fund, which has raised over £100 million to date … Now, of course, it’s become very difficult to persuade young people to not take the private income. And now it’s a massive industry. A £23 billion industry. And the fees are huge in all countries, and there’s a lot of overcharging.”
What’s more, many couples are resorting to it when they don’t need it at all. Because it’s such a moneymaker for clinics, they don’t do their due diligence as medical professionals, instead guiding hopeful mothers down a costly and exhausting path they need not explore at all.
The women are victims here, and entrust professionals who should be more forthcoming with the information. How can they know whether they need it?
”If you’re a young woman, you’re not really infertile unless you’ve been trying for a year. For the average couple, it takes 4.5 months of trying to become pregnant. But some women, if they can afford it, end up going for 18 cycles of IVF, and they become professional patients. And they don’t know why it isn’t working, because nobody does. But if they go for an assessment, they might find the issue is very minor and very inexpensive to fix.”
This effect is hardly surprising. Countless industries are build on knowledge gaps. By making the problem seem worse than it is, worried customers will pay more to assuage their concerns.
This is true of pregnancy. There are few things a person values more in their life than their children, or their ability to one day have them. Cast doubt on that, and they’ll do anything to have it undone. The impression women get about their fertility is that it’s a black-and-white issue - you are either fertile, or you are not. If you’re struggling to conceive, it’s something that can’t be fixed simply.
”Infertility is misunderstood; they see it as a disease, not a symptom. Therefore, a great deal of IVF is unnecessary; the procedure fails, and a few months later they become pregnant spontaneously … The timing of it is not nearly as important as they would have you believe.”
And it’s not only a financial concern. The stress of IVF compounds the key issue. If couples are struggling to conceive anyway, the anxieties, arguments, and distance created by an expensive and risky procedure are only going to make things worse.
In reality, things are much more simple than is often made out…
