Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
House Passes Bill To Shield Insurers From Paying For Abortions In Largely Symbolic Vote
The House backed legislation designed to circumvent a California order that requires health insurance companies to pay for elective abortions. The legislation passed 245-182 on a mostly party-line vote on Wednesday. Republicans say the California order upheld by the Obama administration last month would discriminate against companies and employees that oppose abortion on ethical and moral grounds. (Jalonick, 7/13)
The House on Wednesday approved a controversial abortion bill that supporters say would help shield healthcare providers who refuse to perform the procedure on religious grounds. Anti-abortion lawmakers, including the bill’s chief sponsor, Rep. Diane Black (R-Tenn.), say it would bar state or local governments from penalizing healthcare providers who decline to offer abortions. (Ferris, 7/13)
A Democratic congresswoman is proposing legislation that would keep employers from accessing data about individual employees’ birth-control prescriptions. The Birth Control Privacy Act, introduced in the House of Representatives on Wednesday by Rep. Suzan DelBene of Washington, would explicitly prevent workplace health vendors from sharing information about individual workers’ use of birth control. Rep. DelBene said she introduced the bill in response to a story published this year in The Wall Street Journal that described how some workplace health programs mine employee health data— such as claims for birth-control prescriptions and other information, including age and search data—to predict whether an employee might be pregnant. (Silverman, 7/13)
Meanwhile, the head of the Susan B. Anthony List talks about her top election priorities —
A prominent antiabortion group says banning terminations after 20 weeks of pregnancy and blocking taxpayer funding of abortion and Planned Parenthood are the key issues that it will use to rally support for its congressional and White House candidates this fall, following recent setbacks in the courts. Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, said at a press conference Wednesday that she was encouraging candidates to focus on aspects of the abortion debate where they have the most support — such as getting a bar on abortions later in pregnancy, and preserving restrictions on federal dollars being used for abortion, or for any services at Planned Parenthood, the clinic network that also provides contraception and reproductive health screening. (Radnofsky, 7/13)
