As a health reform bill faced markup in the Senate Finance Committee this past week, there were several attempts to tack on abortion-related (anti-choice, to be more exact) amendments. Thankfully, the first two antiabortion amendments to come up for a vote were soundly defeated. Sharon Lerner explains:
“Both were Senator Orrin Hatch’s ideas. One, the so-called conscience clause, would have expanded existing “opt-out” law, allowing entire insurance companies to refuse to cover abortion on principle. The other would have done away with the Solomonic dodge of the problem of abortion funding proposed in both the Senate and House bills, in which government funds are kept separate from private premiums–and only the private funds used to pay for abortions. Instead, if Hatch had had his way, no insurance company participating in the healthcare exchange would have been allowed to cover abortion.” (“Anti-Choice Amendments Fail in Senate Finance Committee,” The Nation)
Our law already prohibits using federal funds to pay for abortion in almost all cases. Remember when President Obama, during his recent address to Congress on health care reform, emphatically declared that under his bill no federal funds will be used to pay for abortion, and the awkward eruption of applause and cheers that followed from the audience, even from Nancy Pelosi? Shudder.
Lerner points out in another article: “If Republicans don’t have much hope of derailing healthcare reform at this point, they still have a shot at seriously limiting women’s access to affordable reproductive healthcare.”
Genevieve previously remarked that my topic is quite expansive. Reproductive rights and reproductive health coverage are one possible subset of “health care is a women’s issue” to focus on for the coming projects, especially since they have proved to be such a critical point of contention in the past few weeks.
More relevant links:
Dana Goldstein, “Aborting Health Reform,” The American Prospect.
