COVID-19 & Healthcare

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

A new study shows more abortion restrictions went into effect in the last three years than in the previous decade. States pass record number of abortion laws:

State legislatures have passed more laws restricting access to abortions in the last three years than they did in the decade beforehand, according to a new study.

The Washington Post's Sarah Kliff explains:

What made 2010 such a boom year for abortion restrictions? It’s hard to pinpoint a particular reason, but a few factors do stand out. First, Republicans took control of lots of state legislatures in the 2010 midterm elections, allowing them to pass more restrictions than was politically feasible in the past. The Affordable Care Act also ignited a fight over abortion policy, particularly whether federal funds would help pay for abortions (when Americans used their tax subsidies to purchase health insurance coverage). That fight spilled over to state legislatures – the ones that Republicans had recently come to control – and many passed laws restricting insurance coverage of abortion.

Lastly, the focus on late-term abortion, with the 20-week abortion bans, likely played a role, too. As the Guttmacher Institute reports, those bans proliferated quickly, after Nebraska passed the first such law back in 2010. While the majority of Americans do support legal abortions in the first trimester of pregnancy, support for abortion rights falls significantly when you get into second and third trimester terminations. That drop-off in public support could have laid the groundwork for the success of the late-term restrictions.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

On New Year's Eve, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor gave respondents until Friday to file a response to petitions filed by the state of Utah in the marriage equality case, and from the Little Sisters of the Poor in the contraceptive coverage mandate of "ObamaCare" case from Colorado. Those responses have now been filed.

Early reports from the Washington Post: Obama administration asks Justices to lift delay on birth-control rule:

The Obama administration told the Supreme Court on Friday that a group of Colorado nuns does not need a special injunction against the new health-care’s law provision providing contraceptive coverage for employees because the group can easily exempt itself from the requirement.

The government asked Justice Sonia Sotomayor to lift the temporary injunction she issued New Year’s Eve for the Little Sisters of the Poor, a Colorado nonprofit organization that provides services to the elderly. The Affordable Care Act, new provisions of which went into effect Jan. 1, requires employers who provide insurance coverage to include contraceptive services.

But nonprofit organizations such as the nuns’ may opt out of the requirement simply by certifying that they have religious objections, Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr. wrote in a response to Sotomayor filed Friday morning.

The “employer-applicants here are eligible for religious accommodations set out in the regulations that exempt them from any requirement ‘to contract, arrange, pay, or refer for contraceptive coverage,’ ” Verrilli wrote.

“They need only self-certify that they are non-profit organizations that hold themselves out as religious and have religious objections to providing coverage for contraceptive services.”