Health Reform: Where Women Stand to Gain

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This is all fine and dandy...but did anyone think about all of the self-insured people out there that don't have maternity coverage...all because the insurance companies decided that maternity will not be covered for self-insured....

TXmom of TX 8:43PM April 19, 2010

You all realize though, that for the impoverished women that do need these things, you end up paying for them with your tax money anyways right? When I found that I was pregnant we looked at health insurance but insurance for pregnancy, ultrasounds, giving birth, hospital stay, medications, and pediatric care was ridiculously expensive for someone who makes about 16k a year. If we had paid the inflated prices health insurance companies are asking for we would have just ended up homeless, so no point.
So I was forced to sign up for state health insurance, which graciously covered everything. And guess what, your taxes helped pay for that anyways, whether you like it or not, and whether you think that I deserved to have a kid or not.
So since your taxes are already paying for the thousands of women like me who find out they are pregnant and can't afford insurance but choose to keep their child, I think you should be FOR this health reform. Because it takes pressure off of people paying taxes that have less income, and puts more pressure on people with more income.
Being on the receiving end of free government medical care, I am eternally grateful and would not deny anybody else the chance to have the same experience. It is a good thing sometimes to have the government looking out for you. I think more people should just accept that the government is finally going to start giving back to its people, and welcome improved and expanded health care with open arms.

JelliBeen of WA 4:31PM March 25, 2010

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filbertade of AK 2:18AM March 25, 2010

We don't have national health.. we have an insurance pool...

Leigh2 of FL 5:48PM March 24, 2010

Wow. Are you sure, Ms. Kotz, what you have written? I wonder.
As one other commentator mentions, if women get lower premiums, who will get higher premiums to make up for that? If policies are required to pay for all these procedures and maternity care, then those of us who do not need them will be required to pay for them, too. Does any of that bother you? I guess not.
There are dozens of problems with ObamaCare--some that are even bothering Democrats now that they (even in Congress) are finally reading about some of them. But the biggest problems are coming about by all the mandates, doctrines, 117 boards commissions and panels plus the 16,000 new IRS agents to enforce them. This is a bill that restricts our freedom and restricts our own ability to determine our own health care. I simply do not understand how anyone could be for it, even women.
When a government tries to mandate conditions for all of us--like it or not--rather than to have released the power of the free market--to allow each individual to choose the policy they want for THEIR NEEDS from the more than 1300 insurance companies we now have, we have lost both the ability to control the price of health care as well as our own choice of health care.
Soon--because this bill does not let insurance companies sell across state lines, because it mandates specific provisions (you have named but a few), many insurance companies will be unnecessary and go out of business (throwing those people, including women, out of work). Then, with no tort reform and no way to control the cost of government--already out of control--our premiums will rise dramatically, contrary to your simplistic analysis, but it will be too late.
This bill--now law--is a disaster for all of us even if many of us don't yet realize it. If you think not, then travel to England and visit some of their hospitals, many filthy and all with far lower cancer and other disease survival rates than we enjoy here, and see how their National Health Service and their national health care "workers" are doing.

Sherlock Holmes of NH 5:36PM March 24, 2010

"Why is it that women get the same rate as men when they as a group have higher claims"
Has it not occurred to you that MEN get women pregnant and BABIES are the cause of higher claims and not women themselves? Do you think you have no responsibility there? Well, its YOUR baby too!
Also, it is men who skydive, mountain climb, drunk drive, own guns and have sports injuries etc.

Leigh2 of FL 5:19PM March 24, 2010

If women of childbearing age will pay lower premuims, then men of the same age will have to pay higher premiums to make up for the lost revenue. Why is it that women get the same rate as men when they as a group have higher claims when they also get lower rates for life and auto insurance when they have lower claims than men.
I'm Ok with making all insurance rates gender neutral, but not Ok with gender neutrality that is used only when it benefits women (at the expense of men).

Bob of TX 5:00PM March 24, 2010

The choice often lies in the "how" children are conceived portion of birth control. If more people decided to be married before the possibility of having children appeared, perhaps we would have an entirely different perspective on what it means to have an abortion. What I'd like to know is what percentage of those who choose abortion a) are married b) if they are married, is the abortion due to infidelity, c) choose abortion because of rage or incest d) are un-married. I would also like to know the effects having an abortion plays on each of these categories of people. For example: do more people who have an abortion because of rape or incest regret having an abortion vs. those who have abortions because of other reasons? I hear a lot of stories of "baby-killers" ect., but I'd like to know more facts about why people actually choose abortion and it's effects. Unless I know the "whys", how will I ever be able to decide on what I should believe in the "hows" of how health care should approach abortion?

la girl of AZ 3:20AM March 24, 2010

Studies have repeatedly found that 85-90 percent of women regret their abortions. For women who have abortions as the result of rape or incest, the regret is often especially sever and the trauma of the abortion tends to outlast the trauma of the initial abuse.
I am a woman and I was "pro-choice" until I learned what it felt like to find myself pregnant and in a very tough spot, certain that I just wouldn't care if my "problem" went away. Luckilly, before I did anything life-ending (and I mean that in more ways than one), I woke up. I chose an open-adoption. I got as much time as I needed to think things through and make sure it was what I wanted. It's the proudest choice of my life. I love my daughter, and see her often. I love her parents. And I have control over my life. I'm not bogged down in guilt and shame.
A woman once told me I could not be a feminist and be "pro-life" She went on to say, "Even if 90 percent of women regret their abortions, the 10 percent that don't should have a choice." But can you really call it choice when what they thought they were choosing is not what was given? Is it choice when women of color, women in poverty, women in abusive relationships, minors being abused by their parents (who have a vested interest in destroying physical evidence) are the groups who find themselves more often facing the reality of a lifetime dealing with one "choice" they made under great duress with no possibility of changing their minds? I don't think so. Abortion always kills one and generally leaves the other injured. Why on earth would healthcare reform support such a practise?

Kat of MN 2:53AM March 24, 2010

then those who aren't ready for kids need to be careful instead of killing them. i have kids and i'm not ready for them should i be able to drown them in the tub? NO!

cat of IN 8:53PM March 23, 2010