Migration Jurisprudence from the South › Hong Kong

Fok Chun Wa v. Hospital Authority

Court of Final Appeal, Hong Kong · Hong Kong · 2012-04-02 · National court

Citation: FACV 10/2011
Type of case: Constitutional and human rights
Outcome: Decided against the migrant side

Question

May public hospitals charge mainland wives of Hong Kong residents higher fees for giving birth?

What the court decided

Yes. The fee policy was a justified use of limited public resources.

In plain language

Women from mainland China married to Hong Kong men were charged much more to give birth in public hospitals. The highest court let the higher fees stand.

Dalam bahasa sederhana

Perempuan dari Tiongkok daratan yang menikah dengan pria Hong Kong dikenakan biaya persalinan jauh lebih tinggi di rumah sakit umum. Pengadilan tertinggi mempertahankan biaya itu.

Pertanyaan: Bolehkah rumah sakit umum mengenakan biaya persalinan lebih tinggi kepada istri asal daratan dari penduduk Hong Kong?

What happened afterwards

2012-04-02: Judgment.

Sources

HKLII

Open this decision in the interactive collection (compare, filter, Indonesian view, downloads).

Cite as: Institute for Migrant Rights (2026), Migration Jurisprudence from the South, version 0.1, https://theimr.org/court-decisions/d/hk-fok-chun-wa-2012/. This page summarizes a court decision for research and advocacy; it is not legal advice.

For researchers

This collection of decisions is built for empirical legal scholarship and socio-legal research on migration and the rights of migrant workers, as well as for advocacy.

The coded variables support statistical analysis in law: cross-national comparison, regression and event-history designs, and law and economics questions such as how recruitment fees, wage protection and limits on changing employer affect migrant workers. The data can be downloaded for replication.

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