Summary
Some women are being asked to prepay for their baby, a practice that is legal but considered unethical by patient advocacy groups.
The practice is driven by the high cost of maternity care and the way it is billed in the U.S., where bundled billing has become outdated.
Critics say this exacerbates maternity care inequities, with families left to navigate unclear costs and insurance complexities amid rising healthcare expenses.
Bruh, the US is becoming like China.
In China people are expected to prepay for treatment, even life-threatening emergency treatment. Its actually a common trope in Chinese TV drama that a poor person cannot afford an expensive emergency surgery and just so happens to have a relative/friend that became rich and they have to ask their rich relative/friend to pay for the surgery. When I left, its commonly understood that hospital emergency room can deny medical care if you do not pre-pay or show proof of insurance coverage (which most people do not have), I don’t know what its like now, hopefully its different now.
Its not to say the US sending you a 6 digit bill for emergency care is great either, but at least in the US, they save your life first, then bankrupt you, in China, they just tell you to get the fuck out and let you die.
The US now asking people to pre-pay for healthcare is not a good sign, I fear they will eventually be asking for pre-payment even in life-threatening emergency situations.
“Why don’t you want to have kids?” 🙄
I don’t understand how you could have this when its free in france. Someone fuck you up at some point.
It would be nice to have the option to prepay to some degree. Even with insurance over half of her bill was just copays for all the visits.
Asking them to prepay “is another gut punch,” she said. “What if you don’t have the money? Do you put it on credit cards and hope your credit card goes through?”
I’m gonna be that guy: if you can’t handle an unexpected $1k bill, even by putting it on credit or setting a payment plan, you can’t afford to be having a kid.
More on topic, if $960 is the full cost out of pocket for the whole delivery process, that seems pretty cheap to me. (Really healthcare should be socialized, but we’re not there yet.)
Someone better let the “your body, my choice” crowd know.
Oh wait, they’ll be able to get out of child support now.
