Democrats are jumping all over House Minority Leader John Boehner’s claim the Senate health care bill includes an abortion “fee.”
The DNC added the remark to its rapid response blast, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s office sends word (again) that nothing in the bill mandates abortion coverage.
Reid’s office says “no one will be forced to enroll in a plan that covers abortion services,” and the bill requires each state’s public plan make available at least one plan that won’t cover abortion, a guarantee that pro-life customers can buy a policy that does not offer abortion coverage. (That guarantee doesn’t currently exist.)
Reid’s office says the bill requires private plans to segregate federal subsidies from private premium dollars to ensure that only private premium dollars may be used for abortions beyond those currently permitted.
There are provisions in the bill that forbid the Secretary of Health and Human Services to include coverage of abortions “unless it can be determined, in accordance with three sets of accounting standards, that no federal funds would be used for this purpose, and the US Government would not bear the risk for this service.”
Which means abortion could only be covered by the public option if there is a guarantee that it be covered entirely with private money.
