{"id":41865,"date":"2026-08-12T23:33:37","date_gmt":"2026-08-12T18:33:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=41865"},"modified":"2026-08-12T23:33:37","modified_gmt":"2026-08-12T18:33:37","slug":"aoc-is-freezing-her-eggs-many-americans-dont-have-the-money-or-info-to-do-the-same","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=41865","title":{"rendered":"AOC is freezing her eggs. Many Americans don\u2019t have the money or info to do the same."},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"zephr-anchor\">\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">Over the weekend, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/stories\/highlights\/18026875316677269\/?hl=en\">announced on Instagram<\/a> that she had joined the thousands of American women who freeze their eggs every year, a number that has been steadily growing for the past decade.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">\u201cThis is a choice that I am making to feel more in control of my life,\u201d Ocasio-Cortez said in her Instagram story sharing her decision.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">As politicians in the public eye often do, Ocasio-Cortez turned her personal choice into a statement:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<blockquote class=\"duet--article--blockquote _4s58nu0 pn04iq9\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup _4s58nu8 pn04iq1\">Usually I keep my private life quite private, but I have made the decision to start freezing my eggs, and I want to share this because I was weighing it for a very long time. I was saving for it for a very long time, and there just isn\u2019t a ton out there, I feel, and sometimes it can feel very daunting. As women in general, we are not taught about our own bodies. We are not prepared for our own lives. \u2026 We need to show more depictions of women having full lives.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">At the same time, she acknowledged being \u201cin a very privileged position\u201d to be able to take advantage of egg freezing. The <a href=\"https:\/\/resolve.org\/learn\/family-building-options\/egg-freezing\/\">process still typically costs $10,000<\/a> or more \u2014 and most insurance still doesn\u2019t cover it. Not even AOC\u2019s federal health plan. Egg freezing is a luxury afforded only to the people who can pay for it and take on the significant burden of the treatment and all of the uncertainty that comes with it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">Ocasio-Cortez\u2019s announcement underscores the awkward place that egg freezing still occupies in the landscape of fertility access \u2014 at a moment when Republicans in power are <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/policy\/363543\/pronatalism-vance-birth-rates-population-decline-fertility\">lamenting falling birth rates<\/a> and searching for ways to encourage more people to start families. In theory, egg freezing gives women the flexibility to take more control of their decisions about having kids and preserve that possibility for themselves in the future. But in reality, the promises of this important procedure have often been <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/health\/24141538\/egg-freezing-cost-age-ivf-fertility-pregnancy\">unfulfilled<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">Beyond the intimidating price tag, as AOC alluded to, many young women <a href=\"https:\/\/www.asrm.org\/news-and-events\/asrm-news\/press-releasesbulletins\/new-research-reveals-significant-fertility-knowledge-gaps-among-gen-z-women\/\">don\u2019t know some of the basics<\/a> about age-related fertility decline and how to maximize their chances that egg freezing will lead to an actual pregnancy. There are some \u201csignificant gaps in fertility knowledge amongst Gen Z women in particular,\u201d said Danielle Melfi, CEO of Resolve, a fertility treatment advocacy group.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">\u201cThat points to why someone like AOC who has such broad awareness and broad reach across her channels,\u201d Melfi told me, \u201cspecifically younger people who aren\u2019t tuned into any politician but would be tuned into her. Her sharing her story and journey matters.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">Egg freezing is not a panacea, and it never will be. But it can give individuals options and a sense of empowerment. And right now, as AOC acknowledged in her video, those are privileges reserved for the people who are in the know and have the means to take advantage of it. For everyone else, significant barriers still remain.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p><h2 class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup\">Freezing time doesn\u2019t come cheap \u2014 or easily<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">On average, the cost of egg freezing averages between $10,000 and $20,000. And, for most people, including AOC, who makes <a href=\"https:\/\/www.congress.gov\/crs-product\/RL30064\">$174,000 a year<\/a> on her congressional salary alone, health insurance coverage is not an option. According to a 2024 KFF employer survey, just 12 percent of large employers who offer health insurance <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kff.org\/health-costs\/2024-employer-health-benefits-survey\/#a4486645-a51a-4296-adb6-9df818a8cf6c\">provide egg or sperm freezing<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">That\u2019s not for lack of trying.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">As of now, <a href=\"https:\/\/resolve.org\/learn\/financial-resources\/insurance-coverage\/insurance-coverage-by-state\/\">21 states<\/a> have mandates requiring health insurers to provide some level of coverage for \u201cfertility preservation\u201d when it is deemed medically necessary \u2014 for a younger cancer patient who is about to undergo chemotherapy, for example, a more and more common scenario these days. But coverage for what is viewed as elective freezing, as AOC is doing, is still generally not included in those requirements.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--block-placement _13j8zv42 _13j8zv40 duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<div class=\"duet--article--highlight _10sa9oml _1a70pe0\">\n<div>\n<p><h2 class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup\">Sign up for the Good Medicine newsletter<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"_1a70pe4\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1 _1a70pe7\">Our political wellness landscape has shifted: new leaders, shady science, contradictory advice, broken trust, and overwhelming systems. How is anyone supposed to make sense of it all? Vox\u2019s senior correspondent <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/authors\/dylan-scott\">Dylan Scott<\/a> has been on the health beat for a long time, and every week, he\u2019ll wade into sticky debates, answer fair questions, and contextualize what\u2019s happening in American healthcare policy. Sign up <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/pages\/good-medicine-newsletter-signup\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">But even the state-level mandates come with a huge carveout. Under America\u2019s Frankenstein healthcare system, there is a very important type of health insurance plan that is exempt from such state laws: self-funded employer plans, meaning those that fully cover their workers\u2019 medical expenses without relying on an outside insurance company. They are governed only by a federal law known as the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, and that law provides no guarantees for egg freezing or other reproductive care.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">About half of Americans get their insurance through their work, and of those employer plans, more than 60 percent are self-funded. That is a lot of people who have no guarantees for this kind of service, even when a serious medical reason is motivating them to freeze their eggs. The select few who can get egg freezing covered are typically higher-income, too, adding to the disparity between the US healthcare system\u2019s haves and have-nots.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">Support for IVF among the American public has been rising, with 70 percent <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/short-reads\/2024\/05\/13\/americans-overwhelmingly-say-access-to-ivf-is-a-good-thing\/\">saying<\/a> in 2024 that access to IVF was a good thing. And fertility coverage is having a political moment, too: the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.congress.gov\/bill\/119th-congress\/house-bill\/8119\/cosponsors\">HOPE With Fertility Services Act<\/a>, which would require insurers to cover some basic fertility treatment when it is deemed medically necessary, was introduced this year with a bipartisan slate of more than 20 sponsors, though it remains stuck at the committee level for now. The Trump administration has fixated on dropping fertility rates, but, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.asrm.org\/advocacy-and-policy\/fact-sheets-and-one-pagers\/evaluating-the-trump-administrations-initiative-on-ivf\/\">beyond a limited IVF executive order<\/a>, they have not seriously pursued plans to expand access to egg freezing. A national mandate to cover egg freezing, even only when medically necessary, could end up being opposed by both health insurers (which <a href=\"https:\/\/www.guttmacher.org\/gpr\/2006\/05\/movement-against-health-insurance-benefit-mandates-assessing-dangers\">have fought all kinds of benefit requirements<\/a> in the past) and the religious right (which has specifically <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/2020\/7\/8\/21317323\/supreme-court-obamacare-little-sisters-clarence-thomas-pennsylvania-birth-control\">challenged mandates for reproductive healthcare<\/a>, like the Affordable Care Act\u2019s contraceptive mandate).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">It will likely take a variety of policy changes to give people more financial support for this important but expensive service. So what now? Unfortunately, I think we are stuck with patchy coverage and can expect only incremental improvements for the foreseeable future. On the plus side, Melfi said, more employers may increasingly offer these benefits as a competitive advantage.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">But access isn\u2019t the only problem.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p><h2 class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup\">Egg freezing works best when people actually know how to take advantage of it<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">Even if a person is able to access egg freezing, it doesn\u2019t always pay off.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">A study published in the <em><a href=\"https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/40886784\/#full-view-affiliation-1\">American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology<\/a><\/em> in February found that fewer than 6 percent of people who froze their eggs electively had come back to thaw them within five to seven years. Of those people, 79 percent had a usable embryo after warming and 29 percent had a pregnancy that resulted in a live birth.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--block-placement _13j8zv42 _13j8zv40 duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<div class=\"duet--article--highlight _10sa9oml _1a70pe0\">\n<div>\n<p><h2 class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup\"><strong>How to improve your chances with egg freezing<\/strong><\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"_1a70pe6\">\n<ul class=\"duet--article--unordered-list _10sa9omi uyby7v0 pn04iq1 _1a70pe7\">\n<li class=\"uyby7v1\"><span class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup\">Talk with your doctor about your reproductive health.<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"uyby7v1\"><span class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup\">Consider asking your doctor for a blood test to measure your ovarian reserves.<\/span><\/li>\n<li class=\"uyby7v1\"><span class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup\">If you decide to move ahead, check the SART database to find a high-quality fertility clinic. You can explore that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sartcorsonline.com\/members\/Search\">here<\/a>.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">Of course, just because some people haven\u2019t warmed their eggs within seven years doesn\u2019t mean they won\u2019t come back in nine: The point of this service is you could freeze your eggs at 30 even if you\u2019re not ready for kids until you are 40. Those numbers will likely grow with time. And some of those people might end up successfully getting pregnant on their own the old-fashioned way, which means they won\u2019t need their frozen eggs at all.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">\u201cTypically, people who are coming in to freeze their eggs haven\u2019t actually tried to conceive yet. When they are ready to start conceiving, a lot of people may not have any issues conceiving,\u201d said <a href=\"https:\/\/havingbabies.com\/physicians\/mabel-lee-md\/\">Dr. Mabel Lee<\/a>, a reproductive endocrinologist and infertility specialist at HRC Fertility in Pasadena, California who led the published study.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">What is true is that getting pregnant is difficult no matter how you go about it \u2014 even conceiving through intercourse only results in a 20 to 25 percent success rate on a given try, Lee said \u2014 and success with frozen eggs depends on how young the person was when their eggs were preserved: The younger they are, the higher the chances of success. That makes it all the more important that people \u2014 particularly younger people \u2014 know about the realities of egg freezing and how to make the most of it, whether they are spending thousands of dollars of their own money or whether they are using insurance to pay for it. Awareness among young people of the basic relationship between age and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.asrm.org\/news-and-events\/asrm-news\/press-releasesbulletins\/new-research-reveals-significant-fertility-knowledge-gaps-among-gen-z-women\/\">fertility remains discouragingly low<\/a>. Lee said she has patients come in all the time who say they wish they had known more about egg freezing sooner.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">The likelihood of a live birth may go up if the eggs were younger, but is that enough to convince someone in their mid-20s to pay out of pocket to freeze their eggs? In the midst of an affordability crisis, is that even an option? It might not be; in the meantime, Lee said women could get a blood test to <a href=\"https:\/\/my.clevelandclinic.org\/health\/diagnostics\/25142-ovarian-reserve-testing\">measure their ovarian reserves<\/a>, which estimates a person\u2019s egg count, and use that to make an informed decision about egg freezing in consultation with their doctor.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">Once you have decided to freeze your eggs, using a high-quality clinic is a must: That\u2019s the other major variable in success, Lee told me. The Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology maintains a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sartcorsonline.com\/members\/Search\">national database covering clinics<\/a> across the country and tracking birth success rates and other metrics. It\u2019s like a report card of sorts, so you can hopefully choose the best provider for you.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"duet--article--article-body-component\">\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _10sa9omi itxwjq1 itxwjq0 pn04iq1\">There are still no guarantees. Fertility is too fickle. But by improving access and raising awareness, there are clear steps we can take to try to maximize egg freezing\u2019s potential.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Over the weekend, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) announced on Instagram that she had joined the thousands of American women who freeze their eggs every year, a number that has been steadily growing for the past decade. \u201cThis is a choice that I am making to feel more in control of my life,\u201d Ocasio-Cortez said in&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41866,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/platform.vox.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/GettyImages-2270916498.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&crop=0%2C10.736064783953%2C100%2C78.527870432094&w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41865\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/41866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}