Vol. 76/No. 10      March 12, 2012

On Jan. 20 the Department of Health and Human Services announced that churches will be exempt from providing insurance for contraceptives to employees, but that other “religiously affiliated” businesses, such as Catholic hospitals and universities, must provide coverage beginning in August 2013.

The Affordable Health Care for America Act of 2010 lays the groundwork for a massive government bureaucracy to compel most employers to provide health insurance or pay fines, and mandates that individuals who are not insured through their job buy insurance or pay fines beginning in 2014.

This “health care reform,” touted by President Barack Obama as one of his biggest accomplishments, will provide a profit bonanza for insurance companies, while most likely accelerating the decline in the quality of health care for millions of working people. Only now everyone, one way or another, will be either “insured” or fined. And having insurance doesn’t mean you can afford to see the doctor.

The health bill has been accompanied by inroads against existing social programs, particularly Medicaid and Medicare.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops denounced the new requirement that religiously affiliated businesses cover birth control in their health care plans as an attack on “religious freedom,” because the church preaches against contraception. All of the major Republican presidential candidates joined in condemning the mandate.

Three weeks later, Obama announced a “compromise,” saying that religious-affiliated employers who object to providing coverage for contraceptives won’t have to pay for it. He asserted that insurance companies would cover what employers refuse to pay for because it’s more expensive to cover pregnancies and childbirth than birth control.

The right of women to control their own bodies—including access to birth control and abortion that are safe and affordable—is a crucial question for the working class. (Abortion is explicitly excluded from insurance under the new mandate.) Being able to decide whether and when to have children is essential to women’s full participation in society.

The argument that “birth control is cheaper than pregnancy” is harmful to defending this right. It provides ammunition to opponents of women’s rights, who try to claim the moral high ground by saying the issue shouldn’t be an “economic” question. They are right, it is a social and political one. The point is it’s a woman’s right to choose.

The Conference of Bishops called Obama’s compromise “unacceptable,” and is pressing for legislation to exempt any employer from covering any services contrary to their “religious beliefs or moral convictions.”

The working class should always defend freedom of worship—the right of every individual to practice religion or nonreligion free from government interference, hindrance, or “support.”

That’s different than citing “freedom of religion” to justify imposing the positions of the church hierarchy on millions of people. As of 2003 there were more than 600 hospitals affiliated with the Catholic Church in the U.S., 12 percent of the total. In some rural areas they are the only health care provider. These facilities represent huge social wealth, the product of labor of working people. The services they provide should not be limited to those that meet clerical approval.

Finally, this debate highlights the fact that the Democratic and Republican politicians alike are committed to maintaining health care as a profit-making business. As long as this is the case—with or without government insurance mandates—many workers will be faced with limited access and declining quality of medical care, despite the immense resources that our labor has created.
 
 
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