Recently, a health care reform law required all insurance companies to cover the cost of birth control without charging a copay, deductible, or other fees. There are some conservatives who are strongly opposed to this idea. However, polls show that most people are in favor of this law.
In August of 2011, a health reform law will take effect that will require all health insurance companies to cover the cost of birth control, (without charging women copays, deductibles, or other fees). Birth control has officially been included in the definition of preventative medicine, and a previous health reform law requires health insurance companies to cover everything that has been defined as preventative medicine.
The “free birth control” law does not go into affect immediately. Insurance companies are not going to have to abide by this law until August 1, 2012. At that time, they will have to provide coverage for birth control to all women who purchased health insurance after August 1, 2011. If you bought insurance before that date, your insurance company could, potentially, put up a fight about providing the free coverage that the law requires.
Some conservative lawmakers, leaders, and groups have been voicing their opinions about the “free birth control” law. They are strongly opposed to the idea of making health insurance companies provide coverage for birth control.
Perhaps the most outrageous comment about this law comes from Representative Steve King (R-Iowa). He noted that birth control is now being called preventative medicine. He then went on to say:
“Well, if you apply that preventative medicine universally, what you end up with is you’ve prevented a generation. Preventing babies from being born is not medicine”.
Conservative commentator Sandy Rios has mentioned that the United States has a massive amount of debt right now. When she was on Fox news, she said:
“We have $14 trillion in debt, and now we’re going to cover birth control? Are we going to do pedicures and manicures as well? I think that would be a good idea.”
On the other side of the issue, there is information from a poll that was taken by Kaiser Family Foundation. The purpose of the poll was to discover the views of Americans who did not have health insurance. One of the findings ties directly into this debate.
According to Kaiser Family Foundation, 66% of Americans said that they are in support of the decision that was made by the Department of Health and Human Services that will require health insurers to pay for the full cost of birth control and other preventative services for women. This comes out to about two-thirds of the people who took the poll.
Only 24% of the respondents indicated that they opposed the decision made by the Department of Health and Human services.
Image by Monil Markus on Flickr