Pro-Abortion Groups Send Congress Letter, Want More Abortion Funding in Bill
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
March 10, 2010
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — Abortion advocates are not content with the massive abortion funding and promotion of abortion in the Senate health care bill the House may soon consider. More than 50 groups that back abortion combined forces for a new letter to members of Congress demanding more.
The Tuesday letter addressed to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and President Barack Obama, asks for major revisions to the pro-abortion language in the Senate bill.
The groups call the current language funding abortions “unacceptable obstacles for women who wish to purchase insurance that includes abortion coverage and for plans that wish to offer it.”
Pro-abortion groups don’t like the fact that states could opt out of abortion funding, though residents of other states could still be forced to pay for abortions under the bill.
“We are calling on you to make improvements that would ensure that under reform, women will not lose the private health insurance coverage for abortion that they now have,” the groups wrote.
“This language imposes unacceptable new restrictions on abortion coverage that could result in most private health insurers no longer offering coverage for abortion,” the groups add. “Since most women with private health insurance currently have coverage for abortion, the [Sen. Ben] Nelson provision would take away benefits that women have now.”
That contention has already been refuted as it is based on a faulty statistic from the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute.
A different analysis found that 46 percent of private health insurance plans cover abortions.
NARAL and Planned Parenthood coordinated the letter, according to a draft copy LifeNews.com obtained.
Under the Senate health care bill that will be the main bill Obama and Democrats push through Congress, there is no ban on abortion funding. While some states can opt out of funding abortions under the plan, taxpayers in other states will be forced to pay for them.
But the bill contains other pro-abortion problems that are concerns for pro-life advocates.
The bill requires that at least one health care plan be promoted across the country that pays for abortions, more abortion funding would come via the affordability credits, and many of the so-called limits on abortion funding in the Senate bill are temporary and could expire or be overturned at a later date.
The Senate health care bill also pays for abortions under the Indian Health Service program.
And it contains the Mikulski amendment that would allow the Obama administration to define abortion as preventative care and force insurance plans to pay for abortions.
Finally, the Senate bill does not contain language needed to offer full conscience protection for pro-life medical workers and facilities.
The new Obama health care plan proposing final changes to the Senate bill so it can move through Congress corrects none of these problems outlined by leading pro-life groups as reasons for pro-life advocates to oppose the government-run health care bill.
And the changes Obama submitted for the Senate bill under reconciliation actually increases the potential abortion funding for Community Health Centers.
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