上海将取消参保女性生育医疗自付费用   2026-09-09

Shanghai is rolling out a new policy to eliminate out-of-pocket medical expenses related to childbirth, covering routine medical services from prenatal checkups through hospital delivery, in a bid to encourage births and make the city more family-friendly as China’s birth rate sinks to a new low.

Under the new policy, which will take effect on Oct. 1, pregnant women enrolled in Shanghai’s employee medical insurance program will receive a childbirth medical allowance of CNY4,500 (USD671) per person, according to a document released by the Shanghai Medical Security Bureau on September 8. The allowance will cover 42 routine prenatal examination items, with maternity insurance covering any remaining costs in full once the allowance is exhausted.

The policy will streamline the medical reimbursement process for pregnant women and cover some examination items that used to require out-of-pocket payment, a clinical expert at a women’s and children’s hospital in Shanghai told Yicai. This could encourage more women to undergo prenatal examinations and help improve fetal health.

For hospital deliveries, routine inpatient medical expenses incurred from the seventh month of pregnancy to within 42 days after childbirth, including labor pain relief, labor management, vaginal delivery and cesarean sections, will be fully covered by maternity insurance, according to the document. Women who have a miscarriage after seven months of pregnancy will be treated as having given birth and will be entitled to the same reimbursement standards.

The new policy also allows women who are insured in Shanghai and who undergo prenatal check-ups or give birth in hospitals outside the city to receive reimbursement under Shanghai’s maternity insurance program. The subsidy and reimbursement standards will be the same as for those for services received in the city.

“The proportion of older pregnant women in Shanghai is increasing, while people’s expectations for medical expense coverage have continued to rise,” an official at the Shanghai Medical Insurance Bureau told Yicai. “The new policy responds to these needs and will reduce the medical costs associated with prenatal examinations and childbirth.”

In recent years, China has continued to strengthen maternity-support policies in an effort to slow the decline in its birth rate. At the end of last year, the National Healthcare Security Administration proposed that out-of-pocket expenses for hospital deliveries should be largely eliminated nationwide this year. As of July, 28 provinces had introduced measures to implement this goal.

China recorded 7.92 million births last year, with the birth rate falling to 5.63 per thousand, both the lowest levels since official records began.

Source: Yicai Global