Educational Resource
Healthcare Reform: Capps Amendment (2009)
Abortion and Conscience Problems in Health Care Reform Bills (Or: What's Wrong with the Capps Amendment?)
By mid-October 2009, Congressional committees had reported five different bills on health care reform. None of these bills adequately reflects current longstanding federal policies on abortion funding and mandates and on conscience protection in health care.
Three bills (from the House Ways and Means, House Education and Labor, and Senate Health committees) establish broad requirements for basic benefits in health plans (e.g., physicians' services, outpatient services) that federal courts since 1973 have construed to include abortion unless the legislation clearly specifies otherwise. Under such broad categories, the Medicaid statute was funding 300,000 abortions a year until Congress passed the Hyde amendment in 1976 to end such funding. In the same way, these three bills will mandate and fund elective abortions without having to mention abortion.