Adv. Maria Yaneva: In 5 years, the number of people with reproductive problems has doubled

Table of contents:

Adv. Maria Yaneva: In 5 years, the number of people with reproductive problems has doubled
Adv. Maria Yaneva: In 5 years, the number of people with reproductive problems has doubled
Anonim

Lawyer Maria Yaneva was born in Dupnitsa, since 2016 she is the chairman of the "I want a baby" Foundation. Proud mother of a 5-year-old boy and her greatest joy - Radoslav. Especially for the newspaper "Doctor", lawyer Yaneva explained what leads to reproductive problems and how the foundation helps these people.

Lawyer Yaneva, are the number of people with reproductive problems increasing or not in Bulgaria?

- In 2021, our partner organization conducted a nationally representative sociological survey on the issue on the occasion of our campaign together with the Child Protection Agency. As more and more elderly people turn to our foundation for help, the idea was to see if this was a trend or a fluke.

Unfortunately, it turned out to be a trend. In 2014, a nationally representative survey also showed that 145,000 Bulgarians have reproductive problems. And in 2021, they were twice as many - 290,000 people.

What are the reasons?

- Increasingly, young people under the age of 30 do not plan to have a child and a family. They put their careers and personal lives first. In the last survey, we asked the question "what would motivate you to have your first child before the age of 30". It was no surprise that the responses indicated socioeconomic reasons.

Young people do not feel calm and secure about having a child at this age. First of all, women point out that they have no guarantees from their employer that they will stay at work while looking after their child and beyond. That is why we put before the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy the problem of regulating flexible working hours.

From there we were assured that this would become a legislative initiative and that it would soon become a fact. And the covid-pandemic has proven that in most professions people can safely work from home and with flexible working hours, completely online, and do their jobs well.

Another part of the young people explained that they don't have their own home and feel worried about raising their children in their parents' home or renting. In this regard, we put the problem before the institutions. Unfortunately, we still don't have a regular government in whose competence it is to arrange for parents expecting a child a loan with a very low interest rate, even if there is some percentage of initial funding from the state.

This way young parents will be given a good start so that they can raise their children peacefully in their own home. But at this stage it is a frozen project, which I hope will become a reality in the future.

Have you found out what reproductive problems occur most often and which of the two partners they are due to?

- Both the statistics, the sociological surveys and the data of the Assisted Reproduction Fund indicate that sterility is shared between the man and the woman. But always the woman in the couple goes to research. In order to have a better view of the problem, it is very important that both partners are examined.

The biggest problem is age

People close to 40 and over 40 often resort to assisted reproduction. This help should be sought by women under the age of 30 if they have not conceived within 6 months, and women over 30 if they have not conceived within 1 year.

The main problem for natural conception in women is blocked fallopian tubes as a result of untreated inflammatory processes. And in the case of 20-year-olds, chronic diseases of the reproductive system are a consequence of smoking and the drinks they consume. In our campaign in universities, we invited doctors to explain to students the side effects of smoking, alcohol and other drinks on reproductive he alth.

Malnutrition also impairs reproductive abilities. At an extremely young age, obesity and diabetes develop due to poor nutrition. And diabetes always creates a problem with conception.

Image
Image

Lawyer Maria Yaneva

Tell your story? What drew you to the I Want a Baby cause?

- This is a very emotional story for me. I had major, life-saving surgery when I was 21 years old. Then I heard from the doctor who saved my life that I would not be able to have a child naturally. A few years later I met my future husband. That was the first thing I told him. I told him that if he doesn't want to be with me, I will understand.

Only he went with me on the difficult path called invitro. Then I discovered the "I want a baby" foundation, I met its creator, Radina Velcheva. She told me that there are no unsolvable problems for medicine in the 21st century, and that every woman who wants to become a mother must become a mother. A few years later, after several unsuccessful invitro attempts, I heard the happy news that I would become a mother and that my greatest joy was yet to come. I found a solution to the problem when I shared it.

Because I'm from a small town, and in small towns there's a belief that having problems conceiving is something shameful that shouldn't be talked about. But it's not like that. When a person is ready and determined at all costs to have his child, he must overcome this prejudice. It is important that a person is not afraid to seek help. I have said more than once that invitro creates a family, that thanks to invitro I have a wonderful child and a wonderful family.

And how did you become active in the foundation itself, that you even became the chairman of "I want a baby"?

- The then chairman of the foundation offered me this position because he saw in me great hope for the development of I Want a Baby. He asked me "do you want to help people"? It was the hardest and at the same time the easiest decision of my life, because you can't say "I don't want to help" after you've been through it yourself. But it is difficult because I combine my activities in the foundation with my work as a lawyer.

The tension is very high, but every child born is worth the effort. There are already children named after me. I just don't have the right to walk away from my commitment to the foundation. I know how important it is to have someone to lean on, even morally someone to support you. We, the patients with reproductive problems, need mostly moral support.

Apart from advice, empathy and sympathy, how else does the I Want a Baby Foundation help people with reproductive problems?

- For 15 years now, the "I want a baby" foundation has been helping families who cannot have a child naturally. So far, with the help of the foundation, its sponsors, donors and like-minded people, more than 5,000 Bulgarian children have been born. We did a lot of donation campaigns because couples had either already used up the invitro attempts, or for financial reasons were unable to access these costly services at all.

We are in close partnership with state institutions. We are negotiating both the money for the Invitro Fund and an increase in the number of invitro trials that a couple can get funding for. In 2018, the trials funded by the Invitro Fund were increased from three to four.

Perhaps one of our biggest victories is that we were able to get funding and freeze eggs for cancer patients before they start chemotherapy or radiation therapy. Because this is perhaps the only chance for these people to have offspring. Even purely emotionally, this is an incentive for them to recover in order to have children of their own.

And how do you help women with depleted ovarian reserves?

- Not only women towards the end of their fertile age, but also more and more women up to the age of 30 have exhausted ovarian reserve and need donor eggs. Currently, our main priority is promoting egg donation.

The conditions for a woman to donate eggs are to be up to the age of 37, to have already had one live birth and to not have a severe genetic disease or other disease. All examinations and tests that the female donor of genetic material must undergo are free of charge for her. Those wishing to become donors contact our foundation, and we connect them with the medical facility that is looking for donor eggs.

Recommended: