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Socialized Medicine Delivers Royals Better Deal on Childbirth Than Americans Get

Last updated on 2013.08.09

KELO and the Madison Daily Leader treat the birth of a great-grandchild to a powerless monarch as front-page news. But fine: you want a royal-baby post? I got your royal-baby post right here.

A standard baby delivery in the United Kingdom costs about $4,000. For their upscale delivery suite in the socialized National Health Service, Prince William and Princess Kate brought their little George into the world for around $15,000. In the United States, the average cost pregnancy and newborn care is $30,000 for vaginal delivery and $50,000 for C-section. Just as with other health care, we Americans pay absurdly more to deliver babies and still see moms and babies facing greater health risks:

Despite its lavish spending, the United States has one of the highest rates of both infant and maternal death among industrialized nations, although the fact that poor and uninsured women and those whose insurance does not cover childbirth have trouble getting or paying for prenatal care contributes to those figures [Elisabeth Rosenthal, "American Way of Birth, Costliest in the World," New York Times, 2013.07.01].

Cost-conscious American families trying to keep their childbirth costs down often can't even find out what those costs are:

When she became pregnant, [Renée] Martin called her local hospital inquiring about the price of maternity care; the finance office at first said it did not know, and then gave her a range of $4,000 to $45,000. “It was unreal,” Ms. Martin said. “I was like, How could you not know this? You’re a hospital” [Rosenthal, 2013.07.01].

When royalty pay less for health services than working Americans, and when Americans can't even find out the price of those services from their providers, that's free-market failure.

3 Comments

  1. joseph g thompson 2013.07.25

    She didn' use the national health care system if British papers are to be believed.

  2. Joan 2013.07.25

    I thought everybody knew this.

  3. Jerry 2013.07.25

    So then, you dispute the cost of this birthing? The boy who would be king was born in a public hospital, correct? The family is paid for by the public to wave and prattle to their subjects, what a waste of taxpayer money.

Comments are closed.