January 13, 2025
TOKYO – Tokyo will provide subsidies of up to ¥100,000 for anesthesia given for childbirth from October, Gov. Yuriko Koike said Saturday.
The metropolitan government will allocate ¥1.1 billion for the subsidies in its initial budget plan for fiscal 2025.
According to the metropolitan government, this will be the first program of its kind in any prefecture, and women living in Tokyo who receive anesthesia for their delivery at a hospital or clinic in Tokyo will be eligible for the subsidy.
Anesthesia for deliveries is said to cost about ¥120,000 on average in Tokyo. Over six months from October to March next year, a total of 9,500 women are expected to receive as much as ¥100,000 each.
To ensure safety, the subsidy will only be available for anesthesia administered at medical institutions with anesthesiologists or doctors with suitable knowledge of anesthesia. The facilities must also have resuscitation equipment in case women given anesthesia have a sudden deterioration in their condition.
Medical staff will also be trained to ensure they can respond quickly in an emergency.
Normal childbirth is not covered by public health insurance. Though the government provides a ¥500,000 lump sum to help cover childbirth and childcare expenses, this is often not enough to cover everything.
Anesthesia drives these expenses up even further, but because it can help reduce fatigue and stress in women who are concerned about pain during their delivery, more women have been opting to receive anesthesia in Japan.
Deliveries with anesthesia accounted for 11.6% of all childbirths in 2022, up from 5% in 2018, according to the Japan Association of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
In July, during the Tokyo gubernatorial election, Koike made the creation of a subsidy for pain-managed childbirth one of her main campaign promises.
“I want to create an environment in which women can choose to have a pain-managed childbirth and give birth with peace of mind,” Koike told reporters Saturday at the office of the Tokyo metropolitan government.