In the coming days, Parliament will undertake the final reading of an amendment to our legislation. This expands accident cover to include certain maternal birth injuries experienced during labour and childbirth from 12.00am on 1 October 2022.
This is a significant change for ACC, but more importantly represents a positive step for the health of birthing parents and improving equity of access to the Accident Compensation scheme. This change means those with a covered maternal birth injury will be eligible for ACC-funded support, treatment, and care to help them in their recovery.
In preparation for this, our focus has been to make sure health practitioners across the motu can begin lodging claims from 1 October and our systems and people are ready to process them.