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Comment by ben_w | Hacker News Reader

> IIRC a typical child birth can cost $10,000 in medical bills.

Assertions like this — there’sa similar one about hip replacements being more expensive in the USA than flying to Spain for the op and living there for two years — always make me wonder why health tourism from the USA to basically anywhere else isn’t more common.

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> Assertions like this — there’sa similar one about hip replacements being more expensive in the USA than flying to Spain for the op and living there for two years — always make me wonder why health tourism from the USA to basically anywhere else isn’t more common.

Because most people don’t pay that. Medicaid covers half of all births in the US. Insurance covers almost everyone else. We just had a baby last year. Insurance covered almost everything.

Yeah my wifes complicated birth coat 70000 usd and I paid zero. Most people are going to have it covered. And the price listed here is not actually what one would pay of they found themselves in the situation of paying in cash.

There's a pricing/information problem. Say you hear that the hip replacement is $10k in the US and $2k in India. But there's also a place that's $1.5k in India and a place that's $2.5k in India. Which place is good? You haven't a clue. Do you take the risk? Are you going to end up with a hip that lasts shorter than you want it to? That'll be bad for you.

And then comes the fact that insurance pays for most people so the price is hidden. You don't actually pay $10k. Instead everyone pays slightly more than they should for insurance.

Except you do actually pay that $10k, just in the form of money taken out of your pay check to pay for insurance. Insurance which you are likely not wanting to take advantage of because even with insurance you pay out of pocket (albeit subsidized by insurance).

It is along the southern US border for simpler procedures and more expensive dental care. Speaking anecdoctally, some immigrants also return to their home countries for more affordable care as well.

Even though it's cheaper, it doesn't mean people can afford it. Medical bills in the US aren't paid upfront like a trip to Europe, it becomes debt.

I went to University in New Zealand, but my student loan for undergraduate study is higher than every single one of my American friends.

In America the price you see and the price you pay are not the same thing.

How do you expect an American to fly somewhere to give birth?

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