In the future, more places will adjust and once again decouple maternity insurance benefits from marriage
Recently, various regions have continued to intensively release policies and measures to encourage childbirth, among which the adjustment of maternity insurance is an important content. The restrictions on unmarried women applying for maternity insurance have been lifted in cities such as Shenzhen.
Recently, the Xi'an Medical Security Bureau drafted a notice on optimizing and adjusting policies related to maternity medical security benefits, intending to optimize and adjust the maternity medical benefits policies of urban employee maternity insurance and basic medical insurance for urban and rural residents in Xi'an, and publicly solicit opinions from the society.
Among them, in terms of maternity insurance benefits for urban employees, the one-time subsidy standard for outpatient prenatal examination fees for insured female employees has been adjusted from 1000 yuan to 2500 yuan; For those who have multiple births, an additional 300 yuan will be added for each additional birth based on this standard. The reimbursement of hospitalization and childbirth benefits for insured female employees will no longer have a minimum payment line.
In addition, the notice further clarifies that insured female employees and urban and rural residents enjoy maternity insurance or basic medical insurance for urban and rural residents, and are not subject to other conditions such as marriage registration or childbirth registration.
One major background here is that in recent years, cases of unmarried mothers seeking maternity insurance have frequently become a social concern. For example, in 2021, Shenzhen's unmarried mother Mengmeng sued the court to seek her own maternity insurance benefits. According to media reports, by last year, through active coordination by the court, the parties involved had received maternity medical treatment and maternity allowances. Overall, unmarried mothers are unable to receive maternity insurance benefits, mostly due to restrictive provisions of local family planning regulations.
At present, including in Shenzhen and other places, restrictions on unmarried women applying for maternity insurance have been lifted, and the benefits of maternity insurance will be decoupled from marriage registration.
On August 17th last year, Liu Juan, Deputy Director of the Benefits and Guarantees Department of the National Medical Insurance Bureau, stated at a press conference of the National Health Commission that the Social Insurance Law follows the principle of equal rights and obligations. As long as the payment responsibility for maternity insurance is fulfilled, there is no threshold for the state to enjoy the benefits. Moreover, in the list of services provided, the relevant materials required to enjoy the maternity insurance benefits do not require marriage certificates or other materials. "We have also learned that there may be requirements in some places to provide materials related to fertility services. In the future, we will also follow up with relevant departments to better protect the legitimate rights and interests of insured persons."
Dong Yuquan, a population expert and special researcher at the Guangdong Provincial Government Counselor's Office, analyzed that the reason why the benefits of maternity insurance were tied to marriage certificates in the past was to prevent multiple births. The number of births is no longer treated as a penalty object, and the original punishment has been transformed into a service.
Dong Yuquan said that in the past, linking the benefits of maternity insurance to marriage was a relevant regulation made under the conditions of the previous maternity policy. However, with the significant changes in the overall population situation, it is necessary to optimize the maternity policy and population development strategy, and therefore corresponding measures need to be adjusted. Of course, from a procedural perspective, there is a process for making adjustments in various places. More and more places will make similar adjustments in the future.
