Zora Health / Employer guide / Oman
Support employees through fertility treatment, and keep the talent you have invested in.
Fertility treatment rarely fits around a work calendar, and most employees go through it quietly, often while doing some of their best work. Zora Health helps you build practical fertility support, from policies and manager guidance to confidential care navigation and access to 128+ partner clinics in 16 countries, around your workforce and budget. Companies including Hilton, LinkedIn, Sanofi, HSBC, Mastercard, Carousell and Singapore Management University work with us.
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Five things Omani HR leaders should know
- Since February 2024, Oman’s first government fertility centre, at Al Wattayah (Khoula Hospital), has offered free IVF to couples who meet its criteria, including a woman under 42 and no healthy child from the current marriage.
- Ministry of Health standards (2017) limit private fertility treatment to married couples using their own eggs and sperm, and cap storage at 5 years, renewed yearly.
- The Labour Law (Royal Decree 53/2023) gives 98 days’ paid maternity leave and 7 days’ paid paternity leave, funded since July 2024 through a 1% employer contribution to the Social Protection Fund.
- Basic Dhamani health insurance has an annual limit of OMR 4,500 and published summaries do not list fertility treatment. A Muscat clinic put a typical IVF cycle at OMR 1,300 to 1,900 in 2026, and said medication and add-ons such as ICSI can add to the cost.
- With a gross medical trend of 9.0% for 2025 (Aon), a fixed allowance keeps the employer’s cost predictable.
Why fertility is a business problem for employers
Fertility treatment does not fit around a work calendar. A clinic sets the date of a scan the day before. Egg collection happens when the body is ready, usually about 36 hours after a final trigger injection. Then comes a two-week wait, and for many couples, another cycle. Your team feels it: missed meetings, unexplained absences, a strong performer who suddenly goes quiet.
We found no survey of employees in fertility treatment in Oman. Multi-country evidence suggests many hide it: in Carrot Fertility’s 2023 survey of 5,000 people in Canada, India, Mexico, the UK and the US, 79% said they were uneasy discussing fertility at work.
- Resignations. 39% of employees in fertility treatment had left or were considering leaving their job, in Ferring’s 2025 survey of more than 3,600 employees and employers in Australia, France, Japan, Poland and the UK.
- Lower performance. 55% said fertility challenges had hurt their work performance (Carrot, 2023).
- No treatment leave. The Labour Law has no fertility or IVF leave, so appointments come out of annual or sick leave (WTW, 2023).
- Unequal access. The free public IVF centre has strict criteria, reports do not say whether expatriates qualify, and published summaries of basic Dhamani cover do not list fertility treatment (Muscat Daily, 2024; Lockton, 2024).
What employers gain
Keep the people you spent the most to develop
Replacing an employee costs one-half to two times their annual salary, according to Gallup. A written policy, paid time off and a funded allowance can help keep them.
Stand out in a tight labour market
73% of employees facing fertility challenges said a role offering fertility support would appeal to them (Ferring, 2025), and 65% said they would change jobs for fertility benefits (Carrot, 2023).
Make fertility support financially predictable
An annual or lifetime allowance sets the employer’s maximum cost in advance. That matters in Oman, where employers pay the full premium for basic health insurance for private sector staff and their dependants (Lockton, 2024), and where Aon put the gross medical trend at 9.0% for 2025 and gave no figure for 2026 (Aon, 2026 Global Medical Trend Rates Report).
Zora helps employers structure benefits around local costs, the limits of Dhamani cover and the rules on who can receive treatment, within an agreed budget.
Want to see what this would look like for your Omani workforce?
What IVF costs, and what the state pays
Oman publishes no national IVF registry or standard private fee schedule. The World Health Organization estimates that about 1 in 6 people worldwide are affected by infertility; Oman has no recent national prevalence study. In 2024, a Khoula Hospital IVF consultant told Oman Daily that Oman had about 8 IVF centres, all in Muscat Governorate. The government centre carried out 1,482 egg collections in 2024 and 2025 (Times of Oman, February 2026).
| Treatment | Setting | Reported cost or status |
|---|---|---|
| IVF | Government fertility centre, Al Wattayah (Khoula Hospital) | Free for couples who meet the referral criteria |
| IVF, one cycle | Al-Bushra Medical Specialty Complex (SFC Oman), Muscat (private), 2026 | OMR 1,300 to 1,900; medication and add-ons such as ICSI can add to the cost, and packages differ |
| Egg or sperm freezing | Government centre | Offered for medical reasons, such as cancer treatment or chronic disease |
| Egg freezing for non-medical reasons | Private clinics | No verified published price; no public support |
Sources: Oman Observer, 14 February 2024; Muscat Daily, February 2024; SFC Oman, IVF cost guide, March 2026. The private range is one clinic’s own published estimate; ask clinics for current quotes, including medication.
| Item | Public support (or own savings) | What the employee still carries |
|---|---|---|
| Public IVF | Free treatment at the government centre. Referral criteria: the woman under 42 (43 to 44 with good ovarian reserve), no healthy child from the current marriage, BMI under 35. Published reports do not say whether expatriates are eligible. | Time off for appointments, and private treatment for anyone outside the criteria |
| Private sector health insurance (Dhamani) | Employer-paid basic cover with an annual limit of OMR 4,500 (OMR 3,000 inpatient, OMR 500 outpatient). Maternity is optional, and published summaries of the minimum benefits do not include fertility treatment. | IVF and IUI costs, unless the employer adds cover |
| Tax relief | None today. A 5% personal income tax on income above OMR 42,000 starts on 1 January 2028 (Royal Decree 56/2025); EY lists health care expenses among its exemptions, with details left to regulations. This is not a subsidy. | Full cost |
Sources: Lockton, September 2024; Curtis, July 2019; EY, July 2025. Lockton expected the mandate to apply once the Dhamani platform was fully operational at the end of 2025; we found no official notice of full enforcement as of November 2026.
Age is one of the strongest predictors of IVF success. Oman publishes no success rates by age; the government centre’s 272 pregnancies and 99 births came from 837 embryo transfers, with no age breakdown (Times of Oman, 2026).
Live birth rates are lower than pregnancy rates, and older patients often need more cycles, so the size and timing of an allowance matter.
Give Employees Access to Fertility Specialists
Help employees navigate fertility care with access to doctors and clinics, treatment information, and clear guidance on IVF, egg freezing and other fertility options. Employees can explore their options privately, without needing to go through HR.
Fertility support that fits your workforce and budget
You do not need to overhaul your existing health insurance to support employees through fertility treatment. Start with awareness and manager education, add confidential one-to-one support, or introduce a funded allowance across your offices. There is no minimum company size.
Where included in the employer programme, eligible employees can use talks and care navigation without paying Zora a separate fee. Care navigation allowances are set in each proposal. Treatment and other third-party costs are paid separately, either by employees or through the fertility allowance their employer provides.
Companies starting the conversation
Essentials
Expert-led talks for employees and managers, fertility and menopause policy templates, manager guides and full access to the Zora app. Up to 2 talks a year.
Employees supported one to one
Navigation
Everything in Essentials, plus confidential one-to-one care navigation and access to our partner clinic network.
Large and multi-country teams
Complete
Everything in Navigation, plus quarterly anonymised reporting, a dedicated account manager and scheduled review meetings with HR.
Optional add-ons can be added to any programme, subject to availability: hormone and fertility diagnostics and telehealth with specialists. Pricing is tailored to your headcount, your countries and the services you choose. Most companies start with a single talk.
Request a proposal See how Zora works for employers
Comparing fertility benefit providers? Use our RFP question bank
Our RFP question bank has 40 questions, with why each one matters, what a good answer looks like and a scoring sheet for three providers. Six of the questions for Oman:
- Are local-plan employees covered, or only staff on international health plans?
- Do you require an infertility diagnosis before support starts?
- Which clinics do you work with in Muscat, and how do you check their Ministry of Health licensing and reported results?
- How do you set eligibility in Oman, where treatment is limited to married couples using their own eggs and sperm, and how do you support single employees who ask about egg freezing?
- How does the allowance work alongside the free government fertility centre for eligible couples and our Dhamani health insurance policy?
- How do you handle employee health data under Oman’s Personal Data Protection Law, including the Ministry permit needed to process health data?
Your download link appears here as soon as you submit. Zora Health may contact you about employee benefits; see our privacy policy.
Plan your fertility benefit budget
Fertility benefit budget planner
Model the annual claims budget for a fertility allowance. Change any number.
This is a claims budget, not a Zora quotation. Zora’s programme fees, implementation and optional services are separate.
Illustration only. Utilisation is an editable assumption, not observed Zora data. The calculation assumes each user claims their full annual allowance, and excludes programme fees and setup costs. For a tailored model, request an employer proposal.
Estimate the potential workforce impact of fertility challenges
A rough planning scenario. It applies a global infertility estimate to your headcount, so it is not a prediction for your workforce, a measured loss or a forecast of savings from any programme.
Range: OMR 90,200 to OMR 255,200 a year, depending on replacement cost.
Assumptions: infertility affects about 1 in 6 adults (World Health Organization, 2023), applied to employees aged 25 to 44. Replacing an employee costs one-half to two times their annual salary (Gallup, 2019); the headline uses the low end. Absence is valued at salary divided by 250 working days. Exit rate and days lost are your own assumptions.
This is a hypothetical cost scenario, not a prediction of actual employee departures, an estimate of Zora’s financial impact or a guaranteed saving from fertility benefits.
Already have corporate health insurance? Here is where Zora fits
Your medical plan may cover some consultations and tests, but fertility treatment is often limited or excluded, so check your policy wording. Employees still need to understand their options, the public funding they qualify for and which clinic suits them.
Zora works alongside your existing insurance and benefits. We help employees get reliable information, navigate their care options and reach suitable specialists, and we give HR manager guidance, policy templates and, on the Complete programme, anonymised reporting. You strengthen fertility support without replacing your medical plan.
How Zora works
For your employees
Employees join the Zora app with a company code, or single sign-on for larger teams. They can learn about fertility and egg freezing, understand what your benefit covers, book a confidential care navigation call and find partner clinics and specialists.
For HR
- Kick-off, week 1. Agree goals, countries and which employees are eligible.
- Policy and benefit design, weeks 2 to 4. Draft or update your fertility policy using our templates.
- Launch, typically weeks 4 to 6. A launch talk for employees and managers, plus a communications pack for HR to send.
- Live support. Employees book care navigation calls and use the Zora app.
- Reporting, every 3 months, on the Complete programme. Anonymised usage, common themes and our recommendations, reviewed with your account manager.
Privacy
Employee privacy is central to our programmes. On the Complete programme, routine employer reports contain aggregated engagement and utilisation information, with safeguards to prevent identification of individual employees. On every programme, personal health information is not included in standard HR reporting, and employees can get help without telling their manager. Where eligibility checks or claims administration need individual-level data, access is limited to authorised parties for defined purposes, as agreed in writing before launch. Employee data is handled in line with Singapore’s Personal Data Protection Act and Oman’s Personal Data Protection Law (Royal Decree 6/2022), which allows health data to be processed only with a permit from the Ministry of Transport, Communications and Information Technology.
Clinics and doctors in Oman
Zora’s clinic and doctor directory does not list providers in Oman yet. It lists 421 clinics and 1,185 doctors across 25 countries, mostly in Asia Pacific and the Middle East (browse clinics or browse doctors). Employees in Oman can still use Zora’s education and the Zora app. Ask us how your team in Oman would use Zora before you launch. See Zora’s employer guides for every country.
Rules and eligibility in Oman
Who can use assisted reproduction
The Ministry of Health’s Fertility Centre Standards and Regulations for Private Sector (2017) are written for a husband and wife: clinics must keep a copy of an authenticated marriage contract, donor sperm, eggs and embryos are prohibited, and embryos may be transferred only to the wife. A 2019 review in the Middle East Fertility Society Journal notes that the standards follow Islamic law as interpreted in Oman. The standards make no provision for single people or same-sex couples. We found no newer law on assisted reproduction; the Public Health Law (Royal Decree 43/2025) refers to it only in a rule on stem cells. Confirm current rules with local counsel.
Egg freezing
The 2017 standards allow eggs, sperm and embryos to be stored with consent for up to 5 years, renewed each year, require a husband’s consent to freeze a married woman’s eggs, and prohibit taking unfertilised eggs out of the country. They do not say whether unmarried women may freeze eggs for non-medical reasons. The government centre offers egg and sperm freezing for medical reasons (Oman Observer, 2024). Take legal advice before funding elective egg freezing.
Maternity, paternity and nursing time
The Labour Law, published on 30 July 2023, gives women 98 days’ paid maternity leave with no cap on the number of times it can be taken, and a paid nursing hour each day for a year after maternity leave ends. Fathers get 7 days’ paid paternity leave, and employees can take up to a year of unpaid childcare leave (WTW; Curtis).
Dismissal protection and health data
Under Article 12 of the Labour Law, ending a woman’s employment because of pregnancy, childbirth or breastfeeding is arbitrary dismissal (Oman Observer, 2023). Under the Personal Data Protection Law (Royal Decree 6/2022), health data may be processed only with a permit from the Ministry of Transport, Communications and Information Technology (Al Tamimi). The Executive Regulations, issued in January 2024, gave organisations until 5 February 2025 to comply (Clyde & Co).
Leave funded by social insurance
From 19 July 2024, maternity and paternity pay has been funded through the Social Protection Fund, with employers paying 1% of wages for Omani and non-Omani staff in both sectors; domestic workers, drivers and farm workers are excluded (ILO; Oman Observer, July 2024). Under Social Protection Fund Decision No. 13 of 2026, expatriate employees joined the sick leave and extraordinary leave insurance schemes from 19 July 2026 (DLA Piper, 2026).
Why employers choose Zora
Companies including Hilton, LinkedIn, Sanofi, HSBC, Mastercard, Carousell and Singapore Management University work with Zora Health. We work alongside your existing insurance, helping employees use the cover they already have and find suitable specialists based on their needs.
Trying to conceive with a heavy workload took a toll on my husband and me. It helped us understand our options.
Questions HR teams ask us
Is fertility leave mandatory in Oman?
No. The Labour Law (Royal Decree 53/2023) has no fertility or IVF leave. It gives 98 days’ paid maternity leave, 7 days’ paid paternity leave and a daily nursing hour for a year. Employees in treatment usually use annual or sick leave.
Does mandatory health insurance in Oman cover IVF?
The basic Dhamani cover for private sector employees has an annual limit of OMR 4,500, maternity is optional, and published summaries of the minimum benefits do not include fertility treatment. Check your policy wording.
Can our employees get free IVF in Oman?
The Ministry of Health’s fertility centre at Al Wattayah, opened in February 2024, offers IVF free of charge on referral. The woman must be under 42 (43 to 44 with good ovarian reserve), the couple must have no healthy child from the current marriage and BMI must be under 35. Published reports do not say whether expatriates are eligible.
Does Zora replace our health insurance?
No. Zora works alongside your insurance. We help employees understand their options, find suitable specialists and use the cover they already have.
How much does a fertility benefit cost an employer?
It depends on the allowance, eligibility and expected uptake. Use the budget planner on this page for a first estimate, then ask us for a tailored proposal based on your headcount and countries.
How quickly can we launch?
Typically 4 to 6 weeks from contract to launch, depending on scope and countries. Most companies start with a single talk.
Related guides for Omani employers
Build a fertility benefit for your team
Whether you are introducing fertility benefits for the first time or improving an existing programme, tell us your headcount, countries and priorities. We will come back within two working days with suitable services, an indicative budget and a practical rollout plan for your Omani team. No obligation.
Not ready to talk yet? Explore how Zora works
Sources
- World Bank, Fertility rate, total (births per woman), Oman, 2024
- World Bank (ILO modelled estimate), Labour force participation rate, female, Oman, 2025
- World Bank (ILO modelled estimate), Labour force participation rate, male, Oman, 2025
- Ministry of Health, Oman, Fertility Centre Standards and Regulations for Private Sector, 2017
- Middle East Fertility Society Journal, Review of assisted reproduction techniques, laws and regulations in Muslim countries, 2019
- Oman Observer, First govt run fertility centre opens, 14 February 2024
- Muscat Daily, First government fertility centre to open on February 14, February 2024
- Times of Oman (ONA), Over 270 pregnancies, 99 births recorded at fertility centre, 22 February 2026
- Oman Daily, interview with IVF consultant at Khoula Hospital fertility centre, 25 October 2024 (Arabic)
- WTW, Oman: new labor law introduces significant new entitlements, September 2023
- Curtis, Introduction to key changes in the new Oman Labour Law, August 2023
- Oman Observer, New labour law strongly supports working women, 26 July 2023
- ILO, Maternity and paternity benefits launched in Oman, July 2024
- Oman Observer, SPF clarifies maternity leave coverage for non-Omani workforce, 1 July 2024
- DLA Piper, Oman extends mandatory sick leave and extraordinary leave insurance to expatriates, 13 July 2026
- Lockton, Oman updates compulsory health insurance policy, 4 September 2024
- Curtis, Oman rolls out unified health insurance, July 2019
- Oman Observer, Deadline set for private healthcare to join Dhamani platform, 12 March 2025
- Al Tamimi & Company, New Omani Personal Data Protection Law comes into force, 2023
- Clyde & Co, Oman issues Executive Regulations to the Personal Data Protection Law, February 2024
- EY, Oman to introduce personal income tax from January 2028, July 2025
- Aon, 2026 Global Medical Trend Rates Report
- Royal Decree 43/2025 issuing the Public Health Law, Official Gazette 1593, April 2025 (Arabic, via qanoon.om)
- Al-Bushra Medical Specialty Complex (SFC Oman), IVF cost in Oman: 2026 price guide, March 2026 (clinic-published)
- Ferring Pharmaceuticals, Fertility Matters at Work and This Can Happen, workplace fertility survey, November 2025
- Carrot Fertility, Global Fertility at Work report, 2023
- Gallup, This fixable problem costs US businesses $1 trillion, 2019
- World Health Organization, 1 in 6 people globally affected by infertility, April 2023
Information on this page is correct as of 5 November 2026. Laws, public funding, insurance rules and treatment costs change often, so check current rules with the relevant authority, insurer or a qualified adviser before making decisions. This page is general information, not legal, financial, tax or medical advice.