New Trump Rule Allowing Small Businesses to Buy Healthcare Across State Lines is a Pro-Life Victory. Here’s Why

National   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Jan 5, 2018   |   11:31AM   |   Washington, DC

A new move by President Donald Trump to allow small businesses to band together and purchase health care across state lines will provide Americans with additional pro-life Healthcare options.

One of the biggest problems with Obamacare from the pro-life perspective is that many of the healthcare plans on the exchange fund abortions. In fact in some states there are no pro-life options for people to purchase health insurance as all of the healthcare plans on the exchange pay for abortions.

Not only is Obamacare proving unaffordable to millions of Americans—it is proving unconscionable for pro-life Americans who don’t want to pay for health care plans that cover abortion on demand or lack transparency about such coverage. By allowing business owners and small businesses to band together to purchase health insurance across state lines, they can purchase pro-life plans that do not pay for abortions.

Here’s more on what’s happening:

Small businesses and sole proprietors will be able to band together under a new federal rule to create employee health plans that would expand coverage options for 11 million uninsured Americans, senior Trump administration officials said.

The Labor Department rule allowing “association health plans,” placed Thursday in the Federal Register, builds on an executive order by President Donald Trump from October.

One senior Trump administration official said during a background briefing Wednesday that the association health plans will “level the playing field” between small businesses and large corporations and provide “more health care for more people at a lower cost.”

Currently, 8 million Americans employed by small businesses and another 3 million sole proprietors, who do business without employees, don’t have access to a group health insurance plan.

Entry on the Federal Register opens a 60-day public comment period, and the rule could be implemented as early as summer, officials said.

“The main objective of this effort is to expand choices for people who do not yet have insurance and [create] more options for employers and employees to take advantage of,” Robert Moffit, a senior fellow in health policy studies at The Heritage Foundation and a former assistant secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services, told The Daily Signal.

Those options include allowing businesses to find pro-life health care options. As LifeNews has reported, a total of 25 states have opted out of covering elective abortion on the Obamacare exchange. Elective abortion refers to abortion on demand and for any reason. The 25 remaining states (and the District of Columbia) permit elective abortion coverage in Obamacare plans.

As the LifeNews report noted:

Although it is commendable that there are 25 states that have opted out of elective abortion coverage in their Obamacare plans, it should be noted that taxpayers even in those pro-life states are still paying federal taxes that are then used to pay for coverage that includes elective abortion in other states.

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In 2017, an estimated 57 percent of the Obamacare exchange plans in states that have not opted out of elective abortion coverage will cover elective abortion. This amounts to around 891 plans.

In addition, four new states in 2017 will only offer plans that cover abortion, bringing the total to six locales that lack even a single pro-life plan: Alaska, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Vermont, and Washington.

By contrast, in 2016, Hawaii and Vermont were the only two states offering no pro-life plans.

This is a concerning development. In five additional states, 85 percent or more of exchange plans will cover abortion on demand in 2017. Those states include California, New York, Maryland, Connecticut, and New Hampshire.

More health care options is good news for all Americans — but especially the majority of Americans who are pro-life and don’t want to fund abortions.