Government spin doctors are past masters at choosing the optimum moment to release bad news. The trick is, of course, to choose a time when the public’s eye is off the ball.

One story, however, did emerge amidst last week’s World Cup excitement concerning issues the government would probably prefer us to ignore. To many people it represents a terrible own goal for England – and I refer to our country not football squad.

Data gathered by the Fertility Network UK revealed a growing number of areas in England have axed IVF treatment on the NHS in an attempt to deal with austerity policies and funding cuts. In addition, the proportion offering the recommended three cycles of treatment has fallen from 16per cent (33) to 11.5per cent (24) in a year.

The data also shows that a further one in ten NHS areas are considering restricting or axing fertility treatment altogether and that the number no longer offering any cycles has increased from four to seven in the past 15 months.

This is despite guidance from the official NHS clinical advice service NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) that women under 40 should be offered three cycles if they have been trying to conceive for two years.

The result is perhaps predictable. As has proved the case for many parents seeking a well-resourced and effective school in their local area, patients now face a postcode lottery of services. Indeed, evidence has emerged of some families even moving across the country to find an area that still offers three IVF treatment cycles. Others are travelling abroad for treatment which may have fewer safeguards than NHS-delivered services.

Fertility and whether having children should be considered a human right are much in the news at present. Not only is there a growing use of surrogate mothers by all kinds of prospective parents, whether same sex or straight, but every year that passes consolidates scientific advances in fertility treatments that would have astounded previous generations. All of which means our society must decide its core principles on this most essential of questions.

First, I should state a personal interest here. I know well a family that would be short of two kind, intelligent, lovely, hardworking young people if they had not been helped into the world by IVF. So to that extent I am biased.

In addition, anyone who has ever wanted to become a parent knows the deep emotions and natural instincts at play. It comes as no surprise then that couples requiring IVF feel the experience deeply and build their lives around the prospect of creating a precious new person to love and nurture. These issues go to the very heart of what it means to be human.

Of course, others would argue that the world is overpopulated as it is. That we need fewer births, not more, if mankind is to avoid ecological catastrophe. Certainly balancing out world population growth over the coming century is a pressing concern.

Nevertheless, it seems horribly unfair that some couples in the UK are having their chance for parenthood decided by something as arbitrary as NHS health rationing. Indeed, it goes against the founding principles of the NHS to provide an equal and fair access to treatments.

The justification health providers offer is that in a time when the NHS is struggling to provide even basic therapies, IVF has to be seen as a luxury.

But this argument is based on a dangerous misconception: that the NHS has to be in crisis at all. Problems in the NHS are down to government policy and are entirely preventable. If the service was properly funded and the wasteful nonsense of privatising health was abandoned, there would be no need to restrict access to fertility treatments.

Really it depends on ordinary people whether we allow IVF on the NHS to cease. After all, like underfunded state schools, the issue is not a problem for the wealthiest in our society. They always have the option to go private. Although IVF is never certain to bring the gift of new life to desperate couples, surely we can afford to offer them that chance.