<p>You are absolutely correct, and I rescind my example for athletes who are HS and younger. They need all the help and protections they can get - and sometimes this protection needs to be from their own parents. We were involved in LL for a few years and some of the parental behavior was just plain offensive. I admire and am grateful to those coaches who put up with the BS sent their way and acted in the best interest of the kids.</p>
<p>However, this thread relates to contraception which for the most part concerns individual over the age of 18…yes, yes…I know it comes into play for some at a younger age but it is for a few short years and they they turn 18. At what point do adults need to simply accept the responsibility for their own selves. </p>
<p>Wal-Mart, Costco, Sams Club are just a few of the pharmacies which offer very very very very low cost generics if an individual has no insurance. Name brands are also offered at discounts to the uninsured. In the case of the BC pill, you get a prescription for a year at at time and can pick up several months worth in one trip to a pharmacy. At what point is someone ‘adult’ enough to assume responsibility for getting themselves to a pharmacy and putting up the needed $$ to keep themselves safe?</p>
<p>“mini, I think your post is misleading with regard to the position of Catholic Charities.”</p>
<p>No, after they’d come out in favor, the bishops beat them over the heads with wet noodles. (In my state, not only Catholic Charities and Catholic Social Services, but Catholic churches themselves cover contraception in their health plans. They don’t have to do, if they have self-insured plans. They CHOOSE to. It’s never been an issue, or even debated as far as I know. The state has had a mandate for years, and while plans covered by ERISA are theoretically exempt, I have yet to find a plan in the entire state that does NOT cover all preventive health services.)</p>
<p>The mandate uses federal law to solve a ‘problem’ that doesn’t exist. Or if it exists, the solution is wrong. The solution is to make bcps available over the counter.</p>
<p>In the meantime, though, I’m troubled by the “medically necessary” standard, as opposed to “medically recommended” or something else. Postoperative pain relief isn’t medically necessary. You don’t die without it, you don’t even suffer long-term injury without it…you just suffer without it. The alleviation of discomfort is part of health care, too.</p>
<p>“if pregnancy is life threatening for you or your acquaintances, is there a reason why you do not undertake a permanent procedure to prevent it, rather than rely on a less than fool-proof method?”</p>
<p>There are lots of reasons why this might be sensible. The condition that makes pregnancy life-threatening might go away someday (example: a woman on chemotherapy might safely get pregnant after 5 years cancer-free.) A new cure for the condition might be discovered down the road. A woman may have had a terrible reaction to anesthesia in the past and want to avoid all surgery.</p>
<p>I suppose if you consider ‘being fertile’ a medical condition requiring prescription medical care in order to alleviate it, then it is no different than being in post-operative pain.</p>
<p>I would hope that civility returns to those on radio and TV. I hope that Bill Maher also loses his sponsors for using the C word and the T word in connection with a well known female politician.</p>
<p>The federal government doesn’t mandate drugs as part of ANY treatment as part of preventive health services. If there is a drug that would prevent or substantially reduce health risks, as recommended by the U.S. Public Health Service, CDC, and recommended by a panel of the top public health experts and medical professions in the country, it would be mandated, with no co-pay.</p>
<p>A question about having no copay for bc: in the original proposal to mandate coverage of bc, was the benefit supposed to be offered without a copay? Or was the no copay language added when the proposal was modified to be free bc?</p>
<p>Yes, as soon as these organizations no longer operate using federal funds, I will be in complete agreement with you. In the meantime, as long as they are happily operating using the tax dollars of U.S. citizens, then they have already forfieted their right to be separate from the federal government mandates.</p>
<p>If you look at how even disability services work. If you don’t take public tax dollars as a school, you can do as you like. If you do take publice tax dollars, you have to comply. </p>
<p>Childbirth, until the advent of readily available birth control after Griswald vs. Connecticut, was the leading cause of death in young women. I don’t know why everyone wants to run around acting as if birth control does not save lives. Birth control saves womens lives.</p>
<p>"So are you saying that insurance carriers are mandated to cover bcp’s or not?</p>
<p>Wouldn’t most medical treatment “substantially reduce a health risk?” </p>
<p>Insurance companies in virtually all states are mandated to cover “preventive health services”. In 28 states, that explicitly includes bcp - with such mandates put into place by Rep. governors such as Huckabee and supported by guvs such as Romney. Most of those states are “red states”. In all of those, religious organizations who provide insurance are not viewed differently from anyone else. In 8 of those states, churches (including the Catholic Church) are mandated to provide it.</p>
<p>However, companies and organizations who self-insure are exempt from state mandates under a federal law called ERISA. These are usually large companies like Boeing or Weyerhauser, or religious organizations like Providence Health (for which my wife works). These voluntarily choose to provide bcp coverage, again as part of preventive health services.</p>
<p>To your second question, “preventive health services” are specifically defined by a panel of public health/medical experts of the U.S. Public Health Service of the CDC. BCP has been part of those services for a very long time. Medical treatments CAN reduce health risks (more than that, my job is, among other things, to promote chemical dependency treatment as a way to reduce health risks). However, unless it is in the list provided to HHS by the Public Health Service, it doesn’t qualify.</p>