In this interview, host Claudia von Boeselager talks with Dr. Jennifer Garrison, a PhD scientist, about egg freezing. Dr. Garrison clarifies that she is not a medical doctor and frames her comments as science‑based opinion. She argues that egg freezing is heavily over‑marketed as a guaranteed fertility insurance, calling it a “bandaid” rather than a cure for reproductive aging. She explains that success rates are modest – roughly 15 frozen eggs are needed to achieve one viable pregnancy – and that the procedure involves ovarian hyperstimulation, an invasive process whose long‑term health impacts are not well understood. Age is a critical factor: older women retrieve fewer and lower‑quality eggs, reducing success chances. Overall health also influences outcomes; lifestyle choices after freezing matter. Dr. Garrison notes corporate programs now offer egg‑freezing benefits, but stresses the need for better public education and more fundamental research to eventually eliminate the need for IVF. The conversation highlights misconceptions, risks, and the current scientific limits of egg freezing.
I'd love to dig into a few things. And when we were talking about egg freezing as well, and I had some questions from the audience in advance of our conversation asking like, what is the ideal age and when is it too late to look at egg freezing? Was one as well. So maybe we could just look at egg freezing as a topic.
Sure. And I should just— total disclaimer, I am a PhD scientist. I'm not a medical doctor. And so I am not giving any kind of medical advice. So everything that I'm telling you is either science-based or it's just my opinion. And egg freezing is a really controversial topic in my opinion. I think there's been something like, I don't know, IVF has been marketed as a talisman for all reproductive aging issues in women. I think it's really over-marketed. And I think, you know, it's an amazing procedure. It's incredible that we can do this, but it's definitely not a panacea in terms of a solution. It's a bandaid. And a lot of women I think today are sold this false narrative that if they freeze their eggs, they're going to have this insurance policy and they don't need to worry about their fertility because at some point they'll be able to thaw those eggs and have a baby. And while that's true in some cases, we don't really very well on the science side understand how to freeze eggs. We do it and we have some success, but I think the numbers are something like you need to freeze 15 or so eggs to get one that works on the other side. And so those aren't very good statistics. That kind of speaks to our inability or our lack of knowledge around really what makes a good egg. And I think egg freezing is a good option for some women and not a good option for others. And there are a lot of risks associated with it. You're basically hyperstimulating your ovaries to produce a lot more follicles than they normally would. We don't truly understand what the consequences of that hyperstimulation are on a woman's body. Certainly not long-term. And then it's an invasive procedure. It's not just like getting a shot. It's actually an invasive procedure and there are risks associated with it. Having said all of that, I think that there are guidelines about the ages at which a woman can and should freeze her eggs. The older a woman is, the fewer quality eggs she'll get. And yeah, I think it's a really, it's a really fraught issue because it, I think IVF came out of cancer research, not reproductive aging research. And I would love— part of what we're trying to do is to fund scientific research in this space so that we can get rid of the need for IVF. That would be my moonshot goal is to just get rid of the need for it. But please, I would love to discuss further, especially I'd love to hear your questions and thoughts around it.
Yeah, no, I think it's so helpful. And I do have a lot of audience members and I think people see the trends that there are a lot of companies that are now even supporting or a bunch of companies supporting female employees. To do the egg freezing. And I think that the point you made is so valid that it's not the be-all and end-all, right? It's not you're 100% guaranteed to have 100% success if you do the egg freezing. And I think it's such an important awareness that people have as well. And at the same time, your overall health will play a huge role in that as well. So you can't freeze your eggs and then completely destroy yourself and your health and be partying all the time and not sleeping or whatever it is as well, and expect in 10 years' time to be completely in a great state to get pregnant and to have children as well. So I think. There's almost that misconception that, as you were alluding to as well, that it's 100% guarantee if you freeze your eggs, you're fine. So I think that's important. And there were some questions around what is an ideal age. Obviously people say the younger, the better, right? But just that understanding of the whole health consensus around it also.
It's so true. It's so true. Yeah, I really, I call it the anthem of IVF and it's really misleading. And I think one of the things we're trying to do is just to change that narrative, to just let women know that. That yes, this is an option, but it's a pretty serious procedure and you really don't have any guarantees on the other end. Certainly I think the statistics are better if you freeze embryos, but it's the same thing. I was— and women come to me all the time and they say, I had 30 eggs frozen and guess what? I thawed them and nothing came of that. And now I'm approaching 40 and I don't have any other options for biological children. And that can be really devastating. I think it's important that we educate women. And what you said about other factors is so right. The eggs in our ovaries, they're certainly undergoing some kind of a decline with age, but for the most part, they're quiescent. They're not doing very much. But the environment around the eggs, right, both the microenvironment inside the ovaries, but also the macroenvironment of the woman's whole body and how it functions, how the system functions, that really does have a dramatic impact on, on, on egg quality and also on a woman's ability to get pregnant.
