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| Medical Insurance and Surrogate Choice | Every couple of Intended Parents is going to face many costs, which no average parent would ever incur. The majority of these costs are readily apparent and people are aware of them yet at the very beginning of their surrogacy journey. These easily predicted costs are:
The obvious medical expenses for the implantation / insemination process, along with the necessary psychological and medical testing as well as fertility drugs;
All the reimbursable expenses and possible compensation of the Surrogate Mother, and, sometimes, an Egg Donor as well;
All legal fees, which are spent for the initial surrogacy contract as well as the costs for the subsequent parentage proceedings;
All potential overall administrative costs for someone to locate and adequately screen the Surrogate Mother and to coordinate the implementation of the medical, legal as well as financial aspects of every single surrogacy program.
However, in addition to the expected costs, which are mentioned above, as a rule arise costs, which are hidden, sudden or unexpected. The most potentially devastating of these costs may be the actual medical costs of the Surrogate Mother’s pregnancy, into which prenatal care, delivery as well as postnatal care of the Surrogate Mother as well as of the child / children are included. Although as a rule all the participants of a surrogacy arrangement do assume that the health insurance of their Surrogate Mother will cove the bulk of all these expenses, this is usually not the case.
Therefore, it should also be mentioned, that health insurance policies approach coverage for Surrogate Mother pregnancies in a great variety of ways. There even exist health insurances, which have clearly exclude surrogate pregnancies from coverage. To an example of an exclusion of this kind may be referred:
Maternity charges, which are incurred by a covered person, who acts as a Surrogate Mother, are not covered charges. For the purpose of this plan the child / children of a Surrogate Mother will not be considered as being dependent of either the Surrogate Mother or her husband / boyfriend, if there is any, in case if the Surrogate Mother has signed the surrogacy contract, pursuant to which she is to relinquish her child / children right after the delivery.
If there is any clear exclusion of this kind, any couple of the Intended Parents can not rely on the insurance coverage of their Surrogate Mother, and they will either have to look for some alternative coverage for the woman, they have chosen as their Surrogate Mother, and pay all the medical expenses, which are related to pregnancy out–of–pocket, or find another candidate for the Surrogate Mother.
However, usually insurance policies have either uncertain or ambiguous definitions of terms, which, depending on how they get interpreted, may or may not exclude a surrogate pregnancy from being covered. As a possible example, the policies, in which it is simply stated, that they do not provide any coverage for “a Surrogate Mother”, which can mean only that an insured person would not be able to obtain coverage for USING a Surrogate Mother to have a child / children; as well as an eligible dependent only includes “a natural biological child / children”, which may or may not cover a child / children, whom a Surrogate Mother delivers, but to whom she has no genetic relation.
In any of the examples, described above, it is important to make some careful and discrete inquiry of the insurance carrier with the aim of determining the exact intention of the ambiguous provisions, as best as possible, while not unnecessarily alerting the insurance company that one of its clients is going to become a Surrogate Mother. Anyway, there is no guarantee, that the result of this inquiry would be clear enough, and the Intended Parents may still be the subject to a moderate or even significant risk of no coverage. Whether they are willing to assume this possible risk usually depends from one couple of Intended Parents to another.
There are also such policies, which do not have express exclusion or definitions, which obscure the nature or extent of coverage. This is considered to be the best scenario for any couple of the Intended Parents; however, there is no guarantee that the insurance company will not make any attempts to deny the insurance coverage. However, there is something good in it – it is that the insurance company is more likely to lose any appeal for benefits, which the insured would initiate, and all the pregnancy costs are likely enough to be covered. There is also something bad in it – the insurance company can possibly wrongly deny the coverage even without any express exclusion and force the time as well as expense of an administrative appeal in order to obtain coverage. Though, it does not happen often, still it can possibly occur.
Surrogacy may be referred to developing areas of the law; this is the reason why the terms of the applicable insurance policy are not the only factors, which should be considered in the likelihood of appropriate insurance coverage in every particular case determination. It is also necessary to be aware of and be able to provide the evaluation of the developing court cases, which are being decided, not only in the jurisdiction where the Surrogate Mother resides, but across the country as well. Even in case if the court decisions in other jurisdictions may not be binding in other parts of the country, they can still be persuasive precedent if the facts and policies, which are litigated are alike.
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