Congress, Politics, Religion, Uncategorized

The National Women’s Law Center Takes a Position on Contraceptive Coverage & “Extreme” Legislation

Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Guest Blogger

It appears that the Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Republicans are not happy with the change that President Obama made to the health care contraceptive coverage requirement for religious employers. The President’s announcement about the change yesterday initially met with a “reserved response” from the bishops who said it was a “first step in the right direction.” Hours later, however, the bishops issued a statement “blasting the plan.” Along with others, the bishops are calling for Congressional legislation that would reverse the contraceptive policy.

In a blog post earlier today, Judy Waxman, who is Vice President for Health and Reproductive Right at the National Women’s Law Center, expressed her concern about some of the proposed legislation. Waxman wrote that “opponents of birth control in Congress are still focused on taking away access to contraception introducing extreme legislation that threatens health across the board. The pieces of legislation range from allowing any employer, regardless of whether it is a religious entity, to deny coverage of contraception to giving employers the right to refuse coverage of any health care service they find religiously or morally objectionable.”

Igor Volsky of ThinkProgress echoed Waxman’s concern. He reported that Senator Roy Blunt, a Missouri Republican, is expected to introduce an amendment next week “that would permit any employer or insurance plan to exclude any health service, no matter how essential, from coverage if they morally object to it.

Excerpt from Blunt’s proposed amendment:

(6) RESPECTING RIGHTS OF CONSCIENCE WITH REGARD TO SPECIFIC ITEMS OR SERVICES —

“(A) FOR HEALTH PLANS. — A health plan shall not be considered to have failed to provide the essential health benefits package described in subsection (a) (or preventive health services described in section 2713 of the Public Health Services Act), to fail to be a qualified health plan, or to fail to fulfill any other requirement under this title on the basis that it declines to provide coverage of specific items or services because —

“(i) providing coverage (or, in the case of a sponsor of a group health plan, paying for coverage) of such specific items or services is contrary to the religious beliefs or moral convictions of the sponsor, issuer, or other entity offering the plan; or

“(ii) such coverage (in the case of individual coverage) is contrary to the religious beliefs or moral convictions of the purchaser or beneficiary of the coverage.

Waxman also wrote the following in her post:

They are playing politics with women’s health – and it would hurt everyone. Tell your Senators to reject all extreme legislation that would take away women’s access to birth control without a co-pay, and other needed health care.

What would happen if some of these bills became law?

  • Any employer could offer a plan that does not cover maternity care for unmarried women in its plan, claiming that such coverage violates its belief that sex and procreation are permissible only within the marital relationship. (Amendment No. 1520 sponsored by Senator Blunt, R-MO, also known as the “Blunt Amendment”/H.R. 1179)
  • Any corporation whose CEO opposes contraception based on his “moral convictions” could deny all coverage of contraception or any other service to the company’s employees. Even more disturbing, a CEO’s view of “morality” could potentially include concern for the cost of a particular benefit. (S. 2092, also known as “The Manchin-Rubio Bill” and the “Blunt Amendment”/H.R. 1179)
  • Any employer who objects to coverage of vaccines for children could deny this coverage to all employees. (The “Blunt Amendment”/H.R. 1179)

Do you agree with Waxman that some people are playing politics with women’s health? Do you think our Senators should be called upon to reject–what Waxman calls–“extreme” legislation?

**********

I’d like to note that birth control pills can be used to treat some medical conditions—including endometriosis, polycystic ovary syndrome, adenomyosis, dysmenorrhea, and acne. Birth control pills can also lower a woman’s risk of getting ovarian cancer—as well as some other kinds of cancers—if she takes the pills for more than five years.

FYI: Last December, Alice Park penned an article for Time’s Healthland titled Should Nuns Take the Pill to Prevent Cancer?

Park wrote:

Kara Britt at Monash University and Roger Short of the University of Melbourne, writing in the journal Lancet, argue that the scientific evidence is strong enough to consider whether nuns, who do not bear children — a lifestyle that puts them at higher risk of certain reproductive cancers — could be protected by taking the birth control pill.

The article in the Lancet claimed that Roman Catholic nuns pay a “terrible price for their chastity” because not having children puts them at a higher risk of growing breast, ovarian and, uterine tumors.

SOURCES

GOP Ups The Ante, Introduces Legislation To Allow Any Employer To Deny Any Preventive Health Service (ThinkProgress)

Roy Blunt Amendment (ThinkProgress)

Protect Women’s Health: Tell Your Senators to Reject Extreme Legislation (National Women’s Law Center)

Blunt expected to intro bill on contraception coverage (St. Louis Business Journal)

Senator Blunt’s Response To President Obama’s Remarks On HHS Mandate

GOP Sen. Roy Blunt to introduce bill allowing employers to deny coverage for any health service (Daily Kos)

Groups rail against contraceptive coverage ‘mandate’ despite rule change (My Fox Philly)

Bishops Renew Call to Legislative Action on Religious Liberty (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops)

Should Nuns Take the Pill to Prevent Cancer? (Time/Heathland)

Nuns On Birth Control? Experts Say The Pill May Reduce Health Risks Posed By Chaste Lifestyle (Huffington Post)

Nuns should go on the Pill, says Lancet study: Nuns should go on the Pill to reduce their chances of developing cancer, researchers say (The Telegraph)

Combined oral contraceptive pill (Wkipedia)

129 thoughts on “The National Women’s Law Center Takes a Position on Contraceptive Coverage & “Extreme” Legislation”

  1. puzzling,

    What is Plan B?

    Oral contraceptives are drugs. There are certain risk factors associated with the taking of any drug. A doctor can determine which type of oral contraceptive may be best for a particular woman.

    Are there any risk factors associated with the use of condoms?

    Another thing: As I wrote in my post, birth control pills can be used to treat some medical conditions in women.

    P.S. I don’t know how much condoms cost.

  2. Why do you need a prescription to get Plan B?

    Why do you need a prescription to get oral contraceptives? Because they cost $9 – $20/month? How much do condoms cost?

  3. Elaine,
    Where would high school be if condoms needed a prescription? Of course, maybe that is where we are heading, if the Bishops get their way.

  6. How does the Obama administration square this position with Sebelius overruling the FDA recommendation that all women be given over-the-counter access to Plan B emergency contraception?

  8. GOP Continues To Oppose Contraception Coverage Plan Now Supported By Large Catholic Institutions
    By Amanda Peterson Beadle on Feb 12, 2012
    http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/02/12/423563/gop-continues-to-oppose-contraception-coverage-plan-now-supported-by-large-catholic-institutions/

    Excerpt:
    The U.S. Catholic Conference of Bishops almost immediately rejected a compromise on requiring contraception coverage that the Obama administration announced on Friday, and Republicans have continued to attack the accommodation. Under the compromise, religious institutions will not be required to provide contraceptive coverage because insurers will provide contraception directly to employees at no cost, completely removing religious institutions from the equation. But this deal was not enough to satisfy conservative opposition.

    On ABC’s This Week, Rep. Paul Ryan echoed the Republican objection of contraception coverage. Ryan told host George Stephanopolous the compromise is nothing more than a “fig leaf” and an “accounting trick”:

    RYAN: To paraphrase the bishops’ letter, this thing, it’s a distinction without a difference. It’s an accounting gimmick or a fig leaf. It’s not a compromise. The president’s doubled down. […] If this is what the president’s willing to do in a tough election year, imagine what he’s going to do to implement the rest of his health care law after an election.

    STEPHANOPOLOUS: You heard Jack Lew right there, this is not going to force the institutions to pay for the coverage. […]

    RYAN: It’s a distinction without a difference. This is an accounting trick.

    Ryan’s own heavily-Catholic home state of Wisconsin currently mandates contraception coverage without any exclusion for religious institutions. As ThinkProgress reported, Marquette University, a Jesuit institution located in Milwaukee, even decided to offer contraception coverage prior to the state’s mandate.

  9. Elaine,
    Republicans hate workers because those workers don’t vote for them in the numbers that they would like. The workers also demand living wages that prevents employers from making even more money.

  10. Off Topic:

    House Transportation Bill ‘Technical Correction’ Would Strip Workers Of Pay Protections
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/12/house-transportation-bill-rail-drivers_n_1271644.html

    Excerpt:
    WASHINGTON — A little-noted provision in the House Republicans’ controversial energy and transportation bill would strip several thousand workers within the rail-industry of their federal minimum-wage and overtime protections, potentially making low-wage jobs pay even less.

    Listed in the bill under the heading “Technical Correction,” provision 6602 would exempt several companies who transport rail workers from their obligations under the Fair Labor Standards Act, the 1938 law that guarantees basic worker rights. The carveout would allow a handful of boutique contractors to pay no overtime to their drivers who haul rail workers between worksites, often driving long distances of 300 miles or more.

    “It’s outrageous that House Republicans are trying to take away overtime protections for a class of workers at the behest of a special interest,” Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) said of the provision in a statement to HuffPost. “These workers deserve the right to overtime pay. It’s not only a matter of fairness, but also a matter of public safety.”

    Earnings for rail-crew drivers often work out to little more than minimum wage, and many drivers must remain on-call for long stretches. Miller and others worry that by depressing wages further, the quality of the work — and, hence, roadway safety — could decline. Miller is expected to offer an amendment to the bill this week that would maintain the labor protections for rail drivers.

    The House’s transportation committee, which is chaired by Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.) and approved the bill, did not return a request for comment from The Huffington Post. Officials at several of the companies that could potentially benefit from the change — including Professional Transportation, Inc., RailCrew Express and Coach America — also did not respond to requests for comment.

    Jim Stem, legislative director at the United Transportation Union, said he just recently became aware of the provision’s implications, given that the bill would merely tweak a few words in existing law. He called the provision a giveway to contractors in the rail industry. According to Stem, many of the rail drivers already earn low wages and work long hours; the loss of overtime, he said, would have an immediate effect on their paychecks.

    *****

    Question: Why do Republican politicians hate American workers?

  11. SM, he certainly is:

    So it seems like Mitch McConnell isn’t content with letting the issue lie. He intends to call out Obama from the freedom of religion angle. So Obama’s attempt to low key the whole thing hasn’t convinced the hallaluyah crowd, as anyone could have guessed. In the end Obama may just have to be a bit more explicit about what this is all about, which he should have nipped in the bud in the first place; women’s rights. Assuming he knows.

    From TPM:

    “House GOP leaders also said Friday they will move forward with legislation to repeal the birth control rule in its entirety. Republicans from both chambers are aligning themselves with the Catholic Bishops who say the new policy remains unacceptable.

    “The push indicates either that Republicans believe there’s still an opportunity to score political points against Obama, or that they’ve simply calculated they cannot back down now. Regardless, the success of the strategy now rests on the gamble that Republicans will be able to continue framing the issue as one over religious liberty and not contraception, despite the new accommodation Obama carved out.

    http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/02/mcconnell-gop-will-push-to-let-any-employer-deny-contraception-coverage.php?ref=fpa

  13. Will the women (and their husbands) reason their way through this, or will they follow their bishops to the polls?

    Unfortunately, a compromise, not matter how Solomon-like, gathers little media impact and support among readers, the few who are exposed to the truth. Attributing such fine cognitive capabilities is perhaps only wishful thinking, or a projection of one’s own capability on others.

    I hope Obama made the right call. And the predictions become true.

  16. Anyone who thinks Obama doesn’t know exactly what he’s doing is nuts. Biden and others were pushing the “less dramatic” approach from the getgo yet Obama went whole hog. Then he went back to the position Biden was advocating. And … (from an Administration that doesn’t leak) … we all know about it.

    Of course, he smiled sweetly and then introduced the “wedge issue” … claiming there shouldn’t be one. Ho … Ho. The point of the whole thing was to introduce a wedge issue and the Republicans and Roman Catholic Bishops charged in like the idiots they are.

    Andrew Sullivan’s analysis is spot-on and, of course, he waited for the Republicans and Roman Catholic Bishops to fully commit before publicizing.

    That’s called … “Give ’em enough rope ….”

    I don’t know if we’ve reached a tipping point. If I were any good at predicting that sort of thing, I’d be a billionaire. I usually recognize tipping points from a position of hindsight.

    I do know that this was a masterful stroke against those advocating for the War on Women and a positive political stroke for Obama’s re-election.

  17. Andrew Sullivan: How Obama Set a Contraception Trap for the Right
    Feb 13, 2012
    http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/02/12/andrew-sullivan-how-obama-set-a-contraception-trap-for-the-right.html

    Excerpt:
    Perhaps some helpful soul could inform the Catholic bishop of Pittsburgh, who last week calmly explained that “the Obama administration has just told the Catholics of the United States, ‘To hell with you!’” A quiet word in the ear of the dogged opponent of gay marriage Maggie Gallagher might have helped too. Just after Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage in California, was struck down by a court on narrow grounds, she titled a blog post: “Ninth Circuit to 7 Million California Voters: You Are Irrational Bigots.”

    Not to be outdone, newly insurgent presidential candidate Rick Santorum described a secular society not based on religious principles as a renewal of the French Revolution and “the guillotine.” Evangelical voters lined up in Minnesota, Missouri, and Colorado to vault him back into the front of the race. And when the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation withdrew support from Planned Parenthood, the reaction from the other side was almost as ferocious. “You don’t make good on a ‘promise’ to your dead sister by selling out women who need you most,” wrote Mary Elizabeth Williams on Salon. When Komen reversed its decision, the pro-life Republican who had been behind it, Karen Handel, resigned, complaining to Fox News about “the level of vicious attacks and coercion … by Planned Parenthood. It’s simply outrageous.

    Who knew the sexual and religious politics of the 1990s were suddenly back, under the president who promised he’d try to end them? And who knew the president himself—who has made an elegant art form out of avoiding exactly these kinds of controversies in his first three years—would have made the final call on the one that suddenly united the entire Republican right in roiling rage? That decision was the now-infamous one to propose a new rule to mandate coverage of contraception, sterilization, and morning-after pills in all health-insurance plans, exempting purely religious institutions, but including Catholic-run hospitals, colleges, and charities who serve the general public and employ many non-Catholics. This, House Speaker John Boehner declared, was an unprecedented assault on the First Amendment by a president who Texas Gov. Rick Perry recently said was “at war against organized religion.”

    Pouring more gasoline on the rhetorical fire, evangelical leader Chuck Colson compared opposing the Obama administration’s contraception rule to Catholic religious resistance to the Nazis. The next week, for good measure, President Obama was conspicuously seen going to church. And at the National Prayer Breakfast, Obama himself defended a fairer tax code as an explicitly religious issue for him: “If I’m willing to give something up as somebody who’s been extraordinarily blessed, and give up some of the tax breaks that I enjoy, I actually think that’s going to make economic sense,” he said. “But for me as a Christian, it also coincides with Jesus’ teaching that ‘for unto whom much is given, much shall be required.’”

    Suddenly no-drama Obama was neck deep in the kind of religious warfare he vowed to avoid. Many pundits—led by older white Catholic men, such as Joe Scarborough and my friend Chris Matthews and even the fair-minded liberal Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne—declared his decision on contraception as not only morally wrong but a politically disastrous violation of religious freedom. Suddenly the specter of 2004—when the culture-war issue of same-sex marriage gave Ohio and the entire election to George W. Bush—reemerged, and some conservative Catholic Democrats began to panic. Within the administration, almost all the white Catholic men opposed the decision—from Bill Daley to Leon Panetta. But critically, the support for the decision came from women, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and key adviser Valerie Jarrett chief among them. So Obama didn’t ignite just a culture war but a religious and gender war as well. Welcome to the election focused almost entirely on jobs.

    But the conflict-driven headlines and predictions of disaster for Obama are, in my view, deeply misleading. Right now, they are driven both by cable news’s love of a good fight and high ratings and by the Republican primary campaign, in which the candidates, especially Newt Gingrich and Santorum, are desperately battling to unify the evangelical base, which is convinced its faith is somehow under attack. In the longer run, however, I suspect this sudden confluence of kerfuffles will be seen as one of the last gasps of the culture war, not its reignition. That’s especially possible since Obama’s swift walk-back last Friday, when he proposed an utterly sensible compromise, which exempts both churches and other religious institutions that cater to the general public from directly covering or paying for birth control, shifting the coverage requirement to insurance companies. So Catholic organizations will be able to stay out of the contraception question entirely, while contraception for all women will be kept free of charge. Instead of being lose-lose for the president, it became win-win. Most Catholics will be fine with this compromise, as are the Catholic Health Association and Planned Parenthood. But the bishops? They’ve gone out on a very long limb. This could be the moment when the culture-war tide finally turns and the social wedge issues long deployed so effectively by the Republican right begin to come back and bite them.

  18. Maybe preaching to the choir, but Glen Smith says it well:

    “On Culture Wars and Running With the Wolves

    “The struggle is not new. And the media should have paid much more attention to this fact. From the Constitutional Convention of 1787 until today, people with radically different concepts of freedom have gone at one another. It’s freedom as individual liberty versus the freedom of some – a church, a state, a corporation – to impose its authoritarian will on others within a pluralistic society”.

    http://firedoglake.com/2012/02/12/on-culture-wars-and-running-with-the-wolves/

  19. So, have the bishops overreached, along with their misogynistic partners in crime in the political world, and will there be a palpable backlash by 80-90% or more of women who this directly impacts at some point in their lives. On top of the Komen scandal, the Catholic church’ ongoing sex abuse scandal, is there a tipping point here somewhere? Or can this so-called center right nation not get enough Christian fundamentalism just to prove how much freedom we have?

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