Senators To Leavitt: Abandon
Attempt To Undermine Women's Health
In letter To
HHS Secretary, 28 Senators Say Proposed Rule Would Limit Women's
Family Planning Options, Access To Health Care Services
(WASHINGTON, D.C.) – Twenty-eight
U.S. Senators today wrote to Health and Human Services Secretary
Michael Leavitt urging him to drop a draft regulation which
could deny access to critical family planning options to
millions of American women. The draft rule, which surfaced last
week in news reports, aims to change the definition of abortion
to include all contraceptives and therefore allow health care
providers and corporations to refuse to provide family planning.
The draft regulation could have
the effect of severely undermining hard-fought state laws that
guarantee women's access to birth control and could put federal
programs like Medicaid and Title X, which provide
family-planning services to millions of women, in jeopardy as
well.
"As a matter of public policy, it
is utterly irresponsible for the federal government to hinder
women's access to contraceptive services. We urge you not to
pursue this course of action as it would seriously undermine the
access of millions of American women to affordable and effective
reproductive-health care," the Senators wrote.
Last week, Senators Patty Murray
and Hillary Rodham Clinton called on Leavitt to kill the draft
rule. While the Senators have not heard back from the Secretary
directly, a Department spokesman indicated that HHS "has an
obligation to enforce" laws that would allow the hiring of
health care professionals who could deny family planning options
to women.
The full text of the Senators'
letter follows or you can read a PDF of the letter
here.
Dear Mr. Secretary:
It has come to our attention that
a draft regulation is being prepared by the Department of Health
and Human Services that would have the effect of encouraging
health-care institutions and individuals to refuse to provide
birth control to patients who need it. We are writing today to
urge you to abandon plans to promulgate such a rule. Though the
proposed rule purports to enforce two existing pieces of
legislation known as the Church and Weldon amendments, in fact,
it goes much further. The draft regulation could deny access
to critical family planning for women across the country.
In particular, the regulation, if
it is published as it presently exists in its draft form, will
define abortion as "any of the various procedures … that result
in the termination of the life of a human being in utero between
conception and natural birth,
whether before or after
implantation." (Emphasis added.) In other words,
the draft regulation would define birth control as abortion and
therefore allow individuals and health-care corporations to
refuse to provide family planning.
By medical definition, a pregnancy
does not begin until a fertilized egg implants in a woman's
uterine wall. Most modern forms of birth control work, among
other ways, by blocking a fertilized egg from doing so. Calling
a fertilized egg "before implantation" a "human being in utero"
is factually and biologically incorrect. Confusing the
definitions of contraception and abortion could have profound
implications, leading to disarray in law, regulations, and
policy.
Here are but a few examples:
First, the regulation would allow
health-care institutions – HMOs, health plans, and hospitals,
for instance - to claim "conscientious objection" to birth
control in addition to abortion, and to refuse to prescribe
contraception and make referrals for birth control.
Second, the regulation directly
undermines many important state laws. It could threaten rape
survivors’ access to emergency contraception in hospital
emergency rooms, and might even prevent women from learning that
this option exists. Fourteen states currently have laws
guaranteeing that access. Similarly, six states have laws
ensuring that pharmacists will fill women’s birth control
prescriptions. This draft regulation could directly undermine
those laws. Finally, 27 states have laws guaranteeing
contraceptive equity in health-insurance plans; this draft
regulation could place those guarantees in jeopardy.
Third, the regulation appears to
stand in open conflict with at least two federal programs that
require contraceptive services to be provided to clients upon
request: Medicaid and Title X. The Medicaid program includes
birth control as a mandated benefit for patients. The sole
purpose of the Title X program is to provide family planning and
other related reproductive-health services. This regulation
could throw both programs into chaos by telling both individual
program staff and health-care institutions that they may refuse
to provide family planning after all.
The fact is, most Americans –
regardless of their position on reproductive choice --
agree that increasing access to birth
control prevents unintended pregnancies – and results in fewer
abortions. As a matter of public policy, it is utterly
irresponsible for the federal government to hinder women’s
access to contraceptive services.
We urge you not to pursue this
course of action as it would seriously undermine the access of
millions of American women to affordable and effective
reproductive-health care.
Sincerely,
Senator Patty Murray
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton
Senator Barbara Boxer
Senator Barack Obama
Senator Debbie Stabenow
Senator Maria Cantwell
Senator Frank R. Lautenberg
Senator John F. Kerry
Senator Bernard Sanders
Senator Robert Menendez
Senator Charles E. Schumer
Senator Patrick J. Leahy
Senator Sherrod Brown
Senator Claire McCaskill
Senator Ron Wyden
Senator Richard J. Durbin
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse
Senator Jon Tester
Senator Barbara A. Mikulski
Senator Tom Harkin
Senator Max Baucus
Senator Dianne Feinstein
Senator Blanche Lincoln
Senator Russ Feingold
Senator Benjamin L. Cardin
Senator Edward Kennedy
Senator Harry Reid
Senator Christopher J. Dodd