Home Births Became More Popular During the Pandemic. But Many Insurers Still Don ’t Cover Them

Tia DeShazor began to question whether she wanted to give birth in a hospital when she was about six months pregnant. It was winter 2021 and COVID-19 was still raging through New York City, where she lives. Pandemic restrictions prevented her husband from attending doctors’ appointments with her, and she wasn’t even allowed to video chat with him during her ultrasound. She felt ignored by her doctors, who assured her that her round ligament pain was normal, even though it was so severe that she had difficulty walking. And she knew about the disproportionate risks to Black women, like her, who give birth in U.S. hospitals. If tennis great Serena Williams had nearly died in childbirth after hospital staff initially dismissed her concerns, she believed the same could happen to her. “They’re not listening to me,” she remembers thinking. “I don’t want to be in labor, and be concerned about something, and be dismissed at an even more vulnerable time.” [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] So DeShazor decided to have a home birth. But she was unable to find a midwife who could deliver her baby at home who was in network with her insurer, MetroPlus, and the Medicaid plan they operate for New York City residents including her. She’d need to hire an out-of-network midwife—but her insurer told her that her Medicaid plan wouldn’t cover one, DeShazor says. (MetroPlus did not reply to a request for comment about the...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized COVID-19 healthscienceclimate Source Type: news