Religions Must Cover Birth Control?

[MarkCharles]

One more proof, or maybe several misinformative proofs that religions are screwing up our health care costs, simply for religious beliefs alone.

Fox News Bias videos at http://bit.ly/jdC5ju

The birth control coverage regulation announced by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius on January 20, slightly modified today, led to a lot of misinformation about the rule in the media, especially on Fox News where I found Fox News anchors misinforming viewers about the exemption for religious employers, about whether "abortion pills" were covered, and about the cost to employers of covering contraceptives, as I show in this video.

The clips I use of Fox News anchor Steve Doocy and Fox News Legal Analyst Peter Johnson. Jr., come from a longer segment of Fox News' February 1, 2012, broadcast of "Fox and Friends" available online at http://bit.ly/wIu6SV

The clip I use of Fox News anchor Bill Hemmer interviewing Becket Fund lawyer Hannah Smith comes from a longer segment of Fox News' February 2, 2012, broadcast of "America's Newsroom" available online at http://bit.ly/vZRjYJ

The clip I use of Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly citing the "cost" of contraceptive coverage comes from a longer segment of Fox News' February 6, 2012, broadcast of "America' Live" which I have not found available online

The quote I use of the HHS regulation exempting some religious employers from covering contraceptives for their employees comes from the US government webpage at http://1.usa.gov/Au2Rhb

The image I use of the California Supreme Court case of Catholic Charities of Sacramento Inc. v. Superior Court, 32 Cal.4th 527 (2004), comes from the Findlaw webpage at http://bit.ly/wZgfry

The image I use of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists' Equity Toolkit comes from the ACOG webpage at http://bit.ly/zprrQ0

The images I use of the White House blog post titled "Health Reform, Preventive Services, and Religious Institutions" comes from the White House webpage at http://1.usa.gov/wsk464

The image I use of the Business Group on Health's "Evidence Statement: Contraceptive Use" comes from the BGH webpage at http://bit.ly/x7tO8i

[Autumn]

1. I believe fucking insurance companies must cover birth control

and if fucking Religions are in business, tough shit. Pay your fucking part of your employees insurance premiums and STFU. Get rid of their tax exemptions.

[MarkCharles]

2. I actually think that this argues for single payer

There are Catholics in Germany, Canada, England.

Health Insurance covers all this in those nations and dozens of others.

All in all, it's about 8-12% of wages, paid in taxes to one government source (or two, Provincial and Federal in Canada where benefits vary province by province).

Bottom line: the government is the final payer of all medical debt for services rendered to the nation's people.

In the USA, health care costs over 10, or as much as 15% of national productivity. If we eliminate the middle man, the FOR PROFIT insurance companies, we reduce cost by 20% minimum. Then we put in national computerized records, available worldwide, we move 30% of nursing home patients back home to a place where they feel they are at home and 10 min away from medical care, we increase the health of the 2-82 year old healthy people, we increase their productivity, we tax our nation's productivity to make sure all work done here gets the worldwide revenue from that labor, we work our public servants 10% more to reduce the cost of public labor and we give medical personnel a maximum annual income in the medical field, (half a million) they do it because they love it, or not at all. This will provide 50-100% more productivity for every dollar spent, better trained and dedicated medical personnel, and little chance any insurance executive retires upon our hard-earned insurance premium dollars.

[IggleDoer]

3. Don't really understand what the CC's problem is ...

They are "concerned" that if they pay an insurance company and the insurance company pays for the employee's birth control, the Church is somehow violating the tenents of their religion.

However if their insurance company is not permitted to provide birth control coverage, then the employees will pay for it themselves, OUT OF THE INCOME THEY GET FROM THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.

Either way, the Church is providing the funds for birth control. What's the difference?

[Crunchy Frog]

4. Religions don't have to cover any health care.

And actually, employers don't have to either, but if they do, then it is reasonable to set regulations on certain health care services that they are required to cover.

Am I the only person that this makes sense to?

[Sal316]

5. This argument is being framed in a "non-truthiness" way.

Churches, etc., are, and always have been exempt.

It's when, as has been ruled numerous times, that you hire and serve the greater public, an organization cannot take the religious liberty exemption. That whole Civil Rights Act thing gets in the way.