Congratulations on the birth of your new baby! Below is an Explanation of Benefits for your recent “Labor & Delivery” charges.

Coming into a hospital through the emergency room means you considered your condition an “emergency,” which costs more. Your baby waving at you from your vagina does not constitute an emergency: it constitutes bad planning. You knew you had this condition for nine months! Next time, consider delivering in a Lyft, the cereal aisle at your grocery store, or during your yoga class.

Claim denied.

Every professional you see will bill for care provided. You should avoid unnecessary consults or tests. It didn’t take a nurse to confirm that, yes, your baby was waving at you from your va-jay-jay, or the two doctors who agreed you should have thought twice before having the huevos rancheros for breakfast. Your husband could have told you that, if he’d been man enough to look.

Claim denied.

Anesthesia is important; Studies show that controlling pain is integral to better outcomes and faster recovery. Unfortunately, your plan only provides for a stick of African Pearwood, Pine, or particle board to bite down on.

Claim denied.

Your hospital room charge was excessive, even if the room had all the equipment necessary to re-start your husband’s heart when he collapsed after seeing little Jimmy’s head pop from your nether regions. A Motel 6 charges considerably less. They will frown upon guests delivering on their beds but we’re guessing they’ve seen worse.

Claim denied.

Only the poor and underinsured pay full “sticker price” for services. We contract with doctors and hospitals to provide services at a discount… say 40% of charges. We raise your premium 20% and then deny any increase at all to doctors and hospitals. We pocket that additional 20%, just in case one of you gets diagnosed with something we have to pay for. But only one of you. This time, it wasn’t you!

Claim denied.

How did we determine this? We have thousands of highly-compensated administrators and utilization specialists standing by waiting to deny your claims. They review ten claims a day; the remaining tens of thousands get re-routed to a post office in Minot, N.D until Mercury is in retrograde. Neither you, nor your hospital knows when, or even if, a claim will be paid.

We try to be benevolent but six out of ten adults have a chronic disease! That’s your fault for getting diagnosed! Would we like to catch some of these conditions early when they can be cured or managed? No! Then we’d have to pay for those screenings and treatment! It’s much cheaper to bank on your fear of high health care bills keeping you out of the doctors’ offices until you die.

The teenager whose face erupts with a huge, volcanic boil the night before prom is as likely to get coverage as you, whose delivery of little Jimmy gutted you like a flounder. We don’t know the difference between an epidermis and an episiotomy, so it’s:

Claim denied.

So, next time, instead of paying for swaddling, diapers, and Ubering your baby in and out of your room in a miniature shopping cart, just shove that squalling bag of human protoplasm back into your vagina like a baby joey, discharge yourself and re-deliver your baby at home.

All claims denied.

We did, however, cover your $26 parking fee. After all, we’re not heartless.

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