Kansas College and University Students Also Pay for Abortions in Insurance Plans

State   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Aug 11, 2010   |   9:00AM   |   WASHINGTON, DC

Kansas College and University Students Also Pay for Abortions in Insurance Plans

by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
August 11
, 2010

Topeka, KS (LifeNews.com) — Yesterday, a national pro-life college student group unveiled new information showing how public university students in North Carolina may soon be forced to pay for abortions in student health insurance plans. A pro-life group in Kansas says it can understand how students don’t appreciate having to do so.

That’s because it fought and lost a battle years ago to stop abortion funding in Kansas as pro-life advocates battled in state regents in 2006.

At the time, regents restructured health insurance for public universities at Emporia, Fort Hays, K-State (Manhattan), KU (Lawrence), KU-Med, Pittsburg and Wichita and abortion coverage made its way into the plan.

Kansans for Life legislative director Kathy Ostrowski explains that the current United Healthcare policy “designed for” undergrads, graduate students and international students forbids coverage for elective abortion while, in the section on allowable pregnancy complications, covers “therapeutic” abortions.

“Therapeutic” abortion, she says, "was the old term for any abortion a practitioner will sign off on. This was the very loophole warned about during debate on the Senate floor."

While elective abortion is supposedly not covered, there are no legal definitions distinguishing between “elective” and “therapeutic” abortions, Ostrowski explained.

"That leaves us with abortionists deciding what to call therapeutic, and in Kansas, we have a nasty history of abortions being obtained for specious reasons," she said. "Kansas has never had a pro-life State Insurance Commissioner to ferret out this abuse, and our current state Supreme Court (particularly Justice Carol Beier) halted the only Attorney General who ever attempted to keep abortionists honest."

"All the more reason a pro-life Governor and more pro-life state representatives need to be elected," Ostrowski said.

The pro-life legislative leader may get her wish fulfilled with the potential November election of Sam Brownback, who would become the first pro-life governor in many years and could help KFL see a real lowering of the abortion numbers in the state and a reduction in how taxpayers currently are forced to support the abortion industry.

As LifeNews.com reported yesterday, Students for Life of America has discovered that the North Carolina Board of Governors will require all students enrolled in a University of North Carolina public institution, starting with the 2010-2011 school year, to have health insurance.

Students who do not already have private health insurance are required to buy a state selected policy from Pearce & Pearce, Inc.

This mandated policy, SFLA told LifeNews.com, covers up to $500 toward elective abortions and has 80% PPO coverage for elective abortions.

The Pearce & Pearce policy costs students $744 per year or $375 per semester and the State of North Carolina will not be paying into the policy. Instead, students who are required to purchase the insurance will be required to pay the entire cost — part of which will go towards the payment of abortions for fellow students.

Kristan Hawkins, the executive director of Students for Life of America, told LifeNews.com, she is disturbed to see how North Carolina students will be forced to pay for elective abortions, regardless of their personal views on the issue.

Related webs sites:
Kansans for Life – https://www.kfl.org
Students for Life of America – https://www.studentsforlife.org

 

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