Associated Press
No one can blame President Obama for lack of effort. A year and a half ago, the White House determined that under the Affordable Care Act contraception would be covered by insurance plans as preventive care without a co-pay. And ever since, the president has tried to shape compromises that satisfy the concerns from religious opponents of birth control.
A week after Obama's latest effort, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops still isn't satisfied.
The nation's Roman Catholic bishops on Thursday rejected the latest White House proposal on health insurance coverage of contraceptives, saying it did not offer enough safeguards for religious hospitals, colleges and charities that objected to providing such coverage for their employees.
The bishops said they would continue fighting the federal mandate in court.
I'm not sure what more the White House can do to make the policy more tolerable for contraception opponents.
Let's recap how the latest administration compromise would work. Let's say you're a woman who works at a religiously affiliated university and you want to take birth control pills, which school administrators have decided are too sinful to pay for. Your employer will offer you a health care plan that doesn't cover the medication, but the university's insurance company will then automatically create a new, separate insurance policy that will cover your contraception for free.
You still get the pills, the preventive care is still available with no co-pay, and your employer no longer worries about subsidizing -- or even being tangentially involved with -- your health care choices that it might choose to find spiritually offensive.
It's not enough, the bishops said.
The bishops said the proposal seemed to address part of their concern about the definition of religious employers who could be exempted from the requirement to offer contraceptive coverage at no charge to employees. But they said it did not go far enough and failed to answer many questions, like who would pay for birth control coverage provided to employees of certain nonprofit religious organizations.
"The administration's proposal maintains its inaccurate distinction among religious ministries," said Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York, the president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. "It appears to offer second-class status to our first-class institutions in Catholic health care, Catholic education and Catholic charities. The Department of Health and Human Services offers what it calls an 'accommodation,' rather than accepting the fact that these ministries are integral to our church and worthy of the same exemption as our Catholic churches."
Of course, in the United States, it doesn't necessarily matter what the leaders of one faith tradition think about the law as it relates to birth control -- the bishops don't get veto power. They can lobby, pressure, and speak out, and they can even refuse to cover all of the health care needs of their employees, but they can't simply reject the law.
The bishops can, however, sue. And as of yesterday, the legal challenges against contraception coverage will continue.
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Simply put, the catholic church wants birth control access eliminated for ALL women. It's interesting to see the rules that they have in various countries where they constantly lose battles such as these.
ALL levels of government need to stand up to the catholic church and essentially tell them that this country is NOT going to become a theocracy.
I'm old enough to remember JFK running for office and the hoopla about it. Non-catholics were going out of their minds worried that the pope was going to be telling JFK how to run the country.
My how things have changed.
Republicans and the Catholic Church are still fighting against The Enlightenment.
Maybe they'd be more believable if they weren't protecting pedophiles.....
It seems now you can't be a republican unless you promise to let the Pope tell you how to run the country.
Yup. They don't give a darn about abortion, really -- less contraception, more abortions. They just want to control what Atrios calls "sexy time."
I suggest that 'free stuff' is also involved here.
So, make the women pay $1/mo. or /year for it, then it isn't 'free'.
If there are more organizations like the CC says, cover them the same way.
While we are at it why not make ALL employer offered insurance plans be the same, separate policy for birth control and anything else that is controversial?
A gaggle of morally-compromised, pervert-protecting, justice-compromising old pigs have the authority to tell us what is "moral"????
Sadly none of these funny hat wearing gentlemen can just snap their fingers and pretend people don't have sex.
They don't have to provide the coverage, they don't have to pay for the coverage. And they want noone else to have to either. So they don't look bad.
Too late.
I am a devout Catholic, but these Bishops need to get out of the 18th century.
This is over the top. Obama can't possibly do any more than he has done. The Church needs to stay out of politics completely. The founding fathers were quite correct in that.
The so called Catholic Church is a business and should be taxed accordingly.
As we should tax the Mormons, and the rest of the Hate/xtian groups...
Frankly, I think all religuluous institutions need to loose their "tax exempt" status...
This is so ridiculous. Free? Really? Just because it has been mandated by the President, it is free? Wow? We could solve all our financial problems with this type of thinking!
If the President can just mandate it for free, why not skip the middle man (the insurance) and just make the medical providers provide contraceptive services for free? Wouldn't that make more sense?
Nothing you say makes sense...
Yes, we all get free ponies because the President said so.
Because clearly, that's what he meant by the use of the word "free." Couldn't possibly mean mean "provided as a benefit under a paid healthcare insurance policy at no added cost." No, he must have meant some ridiculous economically impossible thing, because liberals are just that dumb about how free market economies work.
If you guys devoted half the time to dealing with real ideas that you do to doing battle with strawmen, fewer people would think you're crazy.
They 'DO IT' to try and change the conversation. Period. 'FREE'? OMIGOD we have a CRISIS. But they are the first to whine about welfare. They try to own both sides of the conversation.
Actually Steve, he did mean exactly that. This additional policy for fully insured plans would be 100% free. There would not only be no co-payment or deductible but also no premium for the contraceptive policy.
Read the regulation. The administration believes free contraception is cost-neutral i.e. the savings from preventing pregnancy offset the cost of contraception (note this includes not only pills and IUD's but also surgery to permanently prevent pregnancy). Because it's "cost-neutral" the insurers providing this policy are not reimbursed in any way.
This really is the equivalent of telling Walmart it must give away one free television to every American.
So, educate me. Why use the word "free?" Who is paying for it? My contention is that it is a difference in name only.
I love how no one took my second point. Why not say medical providers have to provide it for "free?"
no one is paying for it. It gets complicated when differentiating between insured and self-insured plans. If it's a self-insured plan i.e. if the employer pays the healthcare costs of it's employees on it's own without involving an insurance company then an insurance company will create a separate contraception only coverage (i.e. not a traditional insurance policy but rather basically a drug card that only covers contraception). That policy will be provided to every female employee of the employer who refuses to offer contraception. That policy will also NOT have a premium or co-pay or deductible or anything attached to it. Now for those insurers (the ones related to self-insrued plans) they will be compensated for the policy through a reduction in a fee they pay to the Exchanges.
However, for the type of insurance people traditionally think of i.e. where a company goes to United Health Care and has UHC insure its employees. UHC will have to create the exact same policy described above and provide it to all females of the employer. For that policy it will also be free and no copay etc but UHC will get nothing for it. It cannot add the cost to the employers plan and it cannot charge the individual, nor can it charge any fees or costs for the drugs themselves. it will be free, the insurer will eat the cost entirely.
re 4.6
To your second point. The reason they're not having the providers provide it for free (my guess anyway) is because of the variety of things that are involved here and that not all drug companies etc are located within the reach of the US government. They probably cannot force a foreign corporation to give away stuff for free (hell they probably can't for a US corporation to either). If they tried to separately ID every medical provider that covers contraceptoin, remember this isn't just drugs it's all forms of BC which includes surgery it would be incredibly difficult. Think about all the things that go into a surgery, how do you differentiate what things are free (contraception) and what are not free, is the knock out gas free or not for instance?
Not remotely. What systemic savings are there in having televisions? (Arguably, in terms of health care costs, it is the opposite: free TVs equals worse health). While contraception gets the attention, there is a whole suite of preventative measures that now much be included at no cost in basic coverage and they are carefully calculated to be things that save on health care costs over time and in the aggregate. That is, prevention is not "given away," prevention is invested in because it provides a positive return on that investment over time.
There is no such argument for TVs. Bad analogy.
Actually it is a good analogy for the point I was making. I wasn't saying they're equivalent in the net benefit to society I personally believe that free contraception is a good thing. My analogy was that it is actually forcing a good/service be provided for free much like forcing Walmart to provide free televisions would be. Whether free televisions is a net benefit is beside my point. I used the Walmart analogy to illustrate that contraceptoin is a service/good provided by a company just like a television. I think that it's something forgotten frequently in America, that benefits provided by insurance are priced into the premium because it costs money to provide benefits. Just like it costs Walmart money to provide televisions for purchase and they work that price into the price of the television.
I completely understand your point about the net benefit of prescription drugs and I happen to agree. However, I do question the political/legal issues surrounding forcing a private entity to provide something for free.
To your other point, the free preventative services are worked into the premium costs for insurance. It is true that there is the possibility that over time Insurance companies will learn through claims experience that free preventative care does save money and then those savings will also be worked into premium costs. The difference between the preventative care (not contraception) and the contraception preventative care is is that in this situation the contraception care cannot be priced into a premium and that is the problem.
Insurance companies don't have wait over time for preventative care to show a benefit. They already do see a benefit and promote preventative care among their customers. For example, my dental plan reduced my deductible for semi-annual exams to ZERO, once I had established a history of going twice a year for exams and cleaning. They know that if I go to regular preventative visits, there is less chance of a high cost visit down the road; one that could have been preventable by a filling a year or two earlier.
Additionally, insurers understand that the cost of even surgical birth control is WAY less expensive, per year say, than the cost of a pregnancy and birth. As a matter of fact, the cost of a tubal ligation would prevent that insurance company from having to ever pay for a pregnancy or birth control for the rest of that customer's lifetime. This is why you don't see insurance companies complaining about the ACA, in addition to the fact that they will now have 33 million new customers added to their rolls.
RobDon- Who cares who pays? It's a small price to pay either way. Get over your penny pinching and look at the bigger picture!
Maybe this has already been argued to death on this thread, but I'm jumping in to say I don't see what's so difficult to understand about this.
1: Wider access to birth control is a public good. It means fewer unplanned pregnancies (which also means fewer people forced into poverty by them), more freedom of choice for women, fewer abortions, less money spent by Medicaid, and less stress on the foster and adoption systems. The book Freakonomics argued that wider access to abortion contributed to the decline in violent crime over the past few decades - if true, it stands to reason that wider access to birth control would have similar effects, in addition to those listed above.
2: Wider access to birth control is good for the insurance companies, and they KNOW it. Requiring them to pay for it is a restriction on them, but doing so saves them an obscene amount of money long-term when they don't have to pay for abortion, pregnancy complications, and child healthcare expenses. Making it a mandate just ensures that everyone gets the same access, and also gives the insurance companies a free pass from being attacked by religious groups - "Hey, don't complain to me, I have to cover it - it's the law."
3: Making providers pay for it doesn't make any sense, because they don't see any gain from it - it's just a sunk cost for them. Insurance companies end up spending millions but saving billions - it makes sense to put it on them instead of on the provider.
It's never going to be enough, until they ensure that women are relegated back to "servant" status and kept under lock and key.
These people piss me off, and have no business "speaking for God."
Signed,
An ex-Catholic
Oh, by the way...to all you "free stuff" antagonists..
Birth control when provided PREVENTS PREGNANCY, the health care costs associated, and the possibility of women seeking abortions.
So, before you start yarping about the costs, imagine the costs without it.
They call it "cost" when it's really all about them exerting control. It always has been. Why should women ever feel as if they are fully human, much less fully adult...?
Secretly amused: #4.2,
Yes, with all the horse s%$# piling up, there has to be a pony in there somewhere.
Birth control prevents unwanted pregnancy and thus must prevent a number of abortions. Well, none of the Bishops are at risk for that problem, are they. So, IMO, stay out of it entirely. This is a woman's problem. Let her and her doctor decide. I am a Catholic, but I don't believe birth control is wrong.
I do believe abortion is very wrong and should be the very, very last thing a woman should do.
These people piss me off, and have no business "speaking for God."
You got that right!
It would be a lot easier to listen to objections raised by senior Catholic clergy if they hadn't spent so many decades hiding the horrific crimes of other priests. The Catholic Church, starting with the current Pope and extending throughout the entire organization, has long since surrendered any right to lecture anyone on morality.
and nobody talks about what happened to girls - there is much more to come when people will listen and take women's words seriously!
The simple fact is that the Catholic Church wants to take away reproductive choices for women. The disgusting truth is that the Church views women as second-class citizens whose primary role in life is to have babies.
Do we need any more proof that religious group are anti woman? I think not.
Years ago I read "Cardinal Sins," which mostly borrowed from a Chicago scandal. The one line I remember is: "People found they could ignore the Pope and still be Catholics." (something like that). When they have the upper hand, they'll press it. Ridiculous.
This sounds exactly like what happens in Iran, where the clerics are the final arbiters of "right" and "wrong". I guess the Catholic mullahs are just as hard to please as mullahs everywhere.
It's not free RobDon, just free to the Church. The insurance company would eat the cost, but since birth control lowers the overall healthcare costs of women, the insurance company probably comes out ahead on the deal. Because a live birth costs more than decades of birth control pills. I can see the church objecting to benefits they have to pay for, but if they're not paying for it they can just shut-up already, or else cop to the fact that they don't want anyone to have birth control.
And yes, if only we'd make sensible public policy based on cost saving measures like these, we could solve a lot of our finanicial problems. But instead, we have a bunch of religious and conservative reactionaries who want to do the opposite, yet they're considered the fiscally prudent ones! It's completely back asswards.
They don't get a say on this.
They sue, they lose.
Who cares what a bunch of old men want!
It's time to step up to the Church and say 'YOU DON'T GET TO DICTATE POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!' There IS separation between Church and State. You whine about 'religious liberty' in the Constitution so now you can respect what the founders believed.
"The First Amendment is a shield, not a sword."
The bishops keep moving the goal posts and if Obama meets their current demands, they will move the goal posts again. I don't think Obama cares much about what the bishops demand since they do not have influence over the Catholic vote which went predominantly to Obama. The bishops have again overestimated their power. Maybe they can get Republicans to help them bang the drum, but most people are no longer paying attention to the issue. There are so many more important moral issues and the bishops can only see one issue. They are irrelevant in modern American society particularly since the number of atheists is growing very fast with younger people.
how about Obama makes them a deal they can't refuse? stand down on the contraception thing, or Justice takes a closer look at the decades long pedophilia ring they were running out of Rome.
A most excellent suggestion!
I second that!
What do you expect from an organization living in the 12th Century AD? The bishops will never change. It is idiotic to expect them to do so. Perhaps only those women willing to abide by Church "teachings" should work for Catholic institutions. Sad.
It is actually more like the 5th Century A.D. That is when the doctrines were establlished by a number of Church Councils, and those who determined the doctrines were the ones dominating the political intrigues of the crumbling Roman Empire. The Patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch and the Emperor and Empress in Constantinople came to the church councils with armed monks who fought and killed each other. The Church has not had any real moral authority since the Council of Nicea, and since the Church became an arm of the Roman Empire.
The Catholic Church was responsible for the creation of the Dark Ages, when Clement of Alexandria (later Pope Clement I) demagogued the ignorant masses into burning down the Library of Alexandria since it had "Satan's Work" in it. The religious scum have always prospered where there is ignorance (see: Xtian Right).
The Church doesn't want compromise, they want their way. And they want their way for everyone.
If women can't get preventative health care or die in hospitals waiting for a miscarriage then so be it.
To expect an institution rooted in the 12th century AD to change is complete idiocy. The bishops will never relent. Perhaps only women who toe the line of Church "teaching" should work for Catholic institutions. But thats discrimination isn't it?
They should hold NO power over the laws of this country. Practicing Catholics are free not to take birth control. End of story.
> The bishops prove hard to please
Oh, the number of nasty and utterly wrong things that headline could apply to.
The @!$%#ing Pope needs to clean his own perverted house before he sticks his nose in our affairs! What a load of crap the Church peddles and why do we care about them? Oh long live Torquemada! sarc
They are just a bunch of old, filthy men in robes and funny hats! Are we seriously supposed to listen to them? What do they know about raising children and normal family life? It's hard to take them seriously- so why is anyone still paying attention?
There's a reason why his nickname is "Ratzi the Nazi".
I do believe that both individuals and societies save when pregnancies are prevented (because, of course, we're not just talking about the cost of the pregnancy, but the cost of the child that results). That would seem obvious.
And for those who posted about the insurance companies having to eat the costs of free bc, most Americans already believe these firms are rolling in profits, so I doubt that will sway many to their side. Yes, I know the argument is that they'll just pass the cost on to the consumer, but that's been going on for 30 years. Health insurance premiums doubled in less than a decade before Obamacare was even proposed much less passed.
I will say, however, that birth control pills (like all meds) are only of value if the patient is compliant. I know there are pros and cons with every method, but the more we can go toward things like implants or IUDs, the better the chance we'll cut down on the unintended pregnancy.
The Catholic Church hierarchy has absolutely no credibility with me. Their ONLY PURPOSE is to PROTECT THEIR TURF. They’ve spent years protecting pedophiles while blaming the victims. When Cardinal Dolan was archbishop in Milwaukee, it was common practice to pay pedophiles to leave the priesthood. Dolan considered it an “act of charity”. More than $16 million was paid to settle with victims and when faced with more lawsuits, the archdiocese filed for bankruptcy in 2011. The actions of the church hierarchy have been disgraceful and IMO should be criminal. The bishops are in no position to tell the rest of us how to live our lives!
I watched HBO's "Mea Maxima Culpa:Silence in the House" the other night. It's a documentary about four young men that unmask sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church. The church hierarchy deserve no respect and any other institution would be criminally libel for aiding and abetting these pedophiles!
Just to make life easier for everybody every church should pay the appropriate taxes for all their properties and income if they want to have a say in policy. If they don't want to pay any taxes they should be sat in a corner and given a time out until they grow up. As far as pleasing them, I shudder to think what would accomplish that. It used to be the burning alive of people they found icky. That has happened just in my father's short time on this earth. Never forget what they are really demanding when they complain about "Suppression" of their religious liberties.