Children & the Law Blog

In her article, Unborn v. Undocumented: A Collision of Policy and Politics, Patricia Gray highlights a likely unintended consequence of the expansion of SCHIP to unborn children: the expansion of SCHIP benefits for prenatal care to undocumented women. Undocumented immigrants are not eligible for federal health benefits since they are unable to furnish social security numbers or other identification required to receive SCHIP and/or Medicaid coverage. However, social security numbers are not required for coverage of unborn children since unborn children obviously do not have social security numbers.

Source: Patricia Gray, J. D., LL. M. Unborn v. Undocumented: A Collision of Policy and Politics (.pdf), Health Law Perspectives, January 2008.