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dandaman6007
dandaman6007Wednesday, March 3, 2010 at 10:23:00 AM EST
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The bill the House passed in November barred abortion funding in programs directly funded by the federal government. But it also banned it in private insurance plans that cover abortion if those plans are federally subsidized. (NPR).
Abortion is a politically charged issue that is at the forefront of the current debate over healthcare. Initially, Democrats didn’t want to change or mess with abortion policy at all; they wanted to maintain the status quos as set by the Hyde Amendment. In 1977 the Hyde amendment barred federal funding for abortion and at first Health Care Reform was not going to change this. But then Stupak and Pitts came along and the Stupak-Pitts Amendment was passed. The effect of this :
“Anyone receiving a subsidy for their premium from the government would not be allowed to choose a plan that includes abortion and that would apply to about 85 percent of people participating in the exchange," said Jessica Arons. She's Director of the Women's Health and Rights Program at the Center for American Progress.(NPR)
So basically, anti-choice legislators used Health Care Reform as an opportunity to stigmatize abortion and make it less accessible for women. This is upsetting, because the whole point of health care reform is to improve health care for all Americans. Abortion is health care. Limiting access to abortion in the process of expanding health care is not Ok, and it would be a major step backwards.
The House bill is more restrictive of abortions then the Senate bill, and currently Democratic leadership hopes to have the House vote on the Senate bill with the Senate abortion language included. Then the Senate would vote on a combined House and Senate bill, and this process of reconciliation only requires a simple majority vote. It could pass without a “supermajority” that Democrats lost recently in the Senate, and it could pass SOON. This is good news. It means that the American people could get meaningful HCR that doesn’t further restrict abortion coverage in the ways that the Stupak Pitts amendment would have done.
This also means that our Representatives have a choice: either vote for a bill that DOES NOT further restrict abortion coverage, or vote against Health Care Reform. I would just like to remind our legislators that abortion IS healthcare, and that they must pass Health Care Reform without restricting abortion coverage.
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by Anatic09
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