Hospitable beds

Because the number of pregnancies has risen since the recent change to the second-child policy, reserving a hospital bed for prenatal examination and delivery has become more difficult, Ren says.

She also suggests the second-child policy has had an effect on the market place. The average charge of a live-in nurse has shot up to 5,000 yuan ($725) a month, double what it was five years ago, she says. Tuition fees in a private kindergarten that teaches both Chinese and English have risen from 4,000 a month to 6,500 yuan a month over the same period, she says, and although a public kindergarten is a lot cheaper, it is difficult to enroll in one.

Whatever the downsides to having a second child, the government is encouraging couples to have them.

Fu Ying, spokeswoman of the Fifth Session of the 12th National People's Congress, said recently that as the second-child policy is implemented it is important to ensure appropriate polices and services are in place to meet the resulting demand.

Beijing News quoted Yang Wenzhuang, a division director of the National Health and Family Planning Commission, as saying the government was striving to improve its medical, child care, education, social security and tax policies, and to develop child care services and ensure women's equality in employment and child care leave.