The two giants will subsidize the vitrification of their employees’ oocytes to the tune of $ 20,000, to enable them to devote themselves to their careers.
Facebook and Apple often talk about their management techniques. But this one is frankly new. According to NBC News, the two giants of Silicon Valley will finance the freezing of eggs for their employees. This expensive treatment allows women to preserve their fertility and then have children.
Attract women
Objective of the communication operation: to attract women to the high tech sector, very popular with men. In both companies, there are two men for one woman. To remedy this lack of parity, Facebook and Apple have deployed great means. The two boxes will contribute up to $ 20,000 to allow women to freeze their eggs.
According to NBC, Facebook has started including egg freezing (whether medically motivated or not) in employer-paid medical coverage in the United States. Apple is expected to emulate it from January. Facebook has been covering the costs of sperm donation, surrogacy and adoption for some time now. New parents can also benefit from paid leave of four months.
Defy the biological clock
Quoted by AFP, the site eggsurance.com welcomes this solution, which would allow women to build their careers while freeing themselves from the rhythm imposed by the biological clock, “no longer to choose between a job and children”.
But many blogs dispute this decision. On the contrary, Internet users believe that it proves that career and motherhood are not compatible. For them, it is actually a way of pushing back one to favor the other.
20% of American women would have their first child by the age of 35. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the number of women who have had their first child between the ages of 40 and 44 has doubled in twenty years, with the attendant risks of infertility and premature births. The number of egg freezes is on the rise “exponentially” in the United States, according to American experts, quoted by ABC News. The banking sector is also said to have put in place financing solutions for this operation.
Egg freezing takes place in several stages. Women must first undergo a treatment that stimulates their production of oocytes, and which can cause bothersome side effects (nausea, abdominal pain, depression) but temporary. The eggs are then removed and stored at a temperature below 0 °. Conservation can cost up to $ 500 per year.
.
