In June 2021, my wife and I were extremely happy to welcome our first son into the world. I know many people express curiousness towards the costs involved with delivery in Japan as the system of it not being covered by health insurance but also somewhat covered by various subventions from the national and local governments makes it all pretty confusing. So here’s a full breakdown of what it ended up costing us.
tldr; I thought I would be claiming a massive 医療費控除 but after tabulating all of my receipts, it seems I severely underestimated how much cash-back I got from various institutions. I ended up in the black even though my wife gave birth with an epidural at the top hospital in Tokyo.
Delivery costs
Wife spent a month in Minato-ku’s Aiiku hospital (she was at risk of going in early labor) from week 31 to 34. She was in a private room per doctor’s order so no extra charge there. Then she gave birth with an epidural and stayed for the standard 5 days after delivery in a private room at 30,000¥ per night.
Total cost: 1,317,059¥
Then we got all of the following cash back:
- Basic childbirth coverage: 420,000¥
- Minato-ku resident childbirth coverage: 280,000¥
- Company’s insurance childbirth coverage: 30,000¥
- Company’s congratulations bonus: 10,000¥ (fucking stingy bastards)
- Company’s insurance extra payments (not sure where this is coming from, I did claim 高額療養費制度): 282,100¥
- Wife’s life insurance coverage (Nissay): 240,019¥
- Wife’s women’s health insurance coverage (Coop Kyosai – subscribed after we confirmed pregnancy just in case): 228,000¥
Total cash-back: 1,490,119¥
Baby stayed in NICU for 2 weeks but that was almost free with extra coverage from Minato-ku. I think we only ended up paying the cost of diapers.
Grand total: 173,060¥ profit
But this profit was offset by other costs accrued during pregnancy as detailed in the next paragraph.
Other costs
The many many pregnancy checkups at Aiiku Clinic, even with the city office coupons, ended up costing quite a bit: I counted 65,000¥ total and it’s missing 2 or 3 visits that happened in 2020 calendar year for which I don’t have the numbers unless I fish out last year’s tax return forms.
We also forked out for the NIPT test which is not covered by insurance nor by 医療費控除 and cost about 180,000¥.