Pro-Life Groups Win One Round in Heath Care Overhaul

Published: Mon 19 Jul 2010

Wendy Blair

Pro-life advocates have scored a triumph and typical Obama-administration allies are lamenting a decision to prohibit most coverage for abortions in insurance pools created for Americans unable to buy medical care on their own.

According to Cardinal DiNardo, the Catholic bishops "welcome this new policy," although he said the group still has concerns about other provisions of President Obama's health care reform law that they fear will encourage abortion.

The issue came to the fore after New Mexico originally decided to permit coverage of elective abortion in a newly begun, federally funded program to offer coverage to high-risk people without insurance who were rejected by private insurers.

Abortion opponents also raised concerns about Pennsylvania's insurance plan, but state officials dismissed the criticism as unfounded.

Trying to forestall additional problems, the Department of Health and Human Services made an announcement last week that the program will not offer coverage for abortions except in the case of incest, rape, or if the mother's life is in jeopardy-all traditional exceptions permitted under federal law.

The policy is significantly more restrictive than will be typically used under Obama's health care overhaul.

Beginning in 2014, the healthcare reform law will permit federally subsidized medical insurance policies to pay for abortions, but only when the policyholder pays for such coverage separately and the money is kept apart from government funds.

The existing program for uninsured high-risk people was also created by the health care overhaul, as immediate assistance for the most needy, until the large expansion of coverage in 2014. However, Congress failed to specify how to address the abortion issue.

Going Too Far?

Pro-choice advocates claim that the restrictions of the Obama administration go too far.

"We didn't expect that women would be treated differently here with regard to the high-risk insurance pool," explained Nancy Keenan, NARAL Pro-choice America's president. "This is inexplicable and wrongheaded to us, and it puts women's lives in jeopardy."

The about-face comes as Democrats have begun to concede that the country's restless political climate could result in the loss of House control in the fall elections. The health care reform law has stayed a strong motivator for detractors of Obama's policies, and no other issue arouses more passion than abortion.

After anti-abortion groups questioned the program for the uninsured, ranking Republicans in Congress acted. They claimed that Obama had allocated millions of dollars of federal funds to cover abortions, reneging on a promise he delivered when he approved an executive order reaffirming the longstanding traditional federal restrictions.

Obama signed the executive order as a concession to encourage pro-life House Democrats to approval the health overhaul bill. The Health and Human Services Department referred to Obama's order in spelling out the abortion-coverage restrictions for the uninsured.