The Royal Baby Is Lucky He Wasn’t Born in America

On April 23, the Duchess of Cambridge gave birth to her third child in a posh London maternity center called the Lindo Wing inside St. Mary’s Hospital, where a small army of attendants looked after her and Prince William for 24 hours in a secluded, luxurious room at a cost of $8,900, according to the Economist. Mother Kate and her 8-pound, 7-ounce baby boy are hale and hearty by all accounts.

Most Western Europeans and Canadians, of course, don’t deliver babies in the Lindo Wing. Otherwise, however, their treatment and outcomes are pretty much consistent with the royal couple’s. Parents pay nothing for their maternity care and delivery, with low risks of maternal and infant mortality.

Americans, by contrast, are saddled with the worst maternal health care in the West. If they do not realize their system is in scandalous disrepair, it is only because they have become inured to it.