The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights, announced Dec. 16 that $200 million in federal Medicaid funds will be kept from California in the upcoming quarter.
The decision is based on the “state illegally mandating that all health care plans subject to regulation by the California Department of Managed Health Care (DMHC) cover abortion without exclusion or limitation,” according to an HHS press release.
According to the Southern Baptists’ Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, the HHS and OCR announced a “notice of violation” in January 2020. The California policy to mandate that health insurance cover elective abortions went into effect in 2014. It has been challenged in the courts by various religious organizations.
The HHS/OCR press release indicated that if the state doesn’t comply, “additional disallowances will be imposed at a rate of $200 million per quarter.”
‘Abortion is not healthcare’
“Abortion is not healthcare,” said an ERLC article. “And it is deeply unfortunate that the state government in California would entangle abortion with actual healthcare services, especially during a pandemic. Now the state is facing the legal consequences of their continued conscience violation.”
Health plan issuers were compelled to remove coverage exclusions and limitations regarding abortion coverage. This made employer groups associated with more than 28,000 individuals out of plans that until that time had chosen to not cover elective abortions.
In responding to the HHS/OCR action, the ERLC said California’s mandate violates the Weldon Amendment, which says that no federal funds appropriated for health care “may be made available to a Federal agency or program, or to a state or local government, if such agency, program, or government subjects any institutional or individual health care entity to discrimination on the basis that the health care entity does not provide, pay for, provide coverage of, or refer for abortions.”
The ERLC said this mandate “even requires healthcare plans covering a group of Catholic nuns serving the poor to include coverage for elective abortions.
According to the press release, complaints were filed by a Catholic order of religious sisters and a non-profit Christian Church, both of which alleged that California Department of Managed Health Care, which licenses and approves over ninety-six percent of “commercial and public health plan enrollment” within California, began mandating abortion coverage in 2014, without exclusion or limitation for health plans throughout the state.
“Such an overwhelming state fiat on a sensitive and contested issue is well outside the bounds of both federal law and common decency.”
The OCR, which is charged with enforcing federal conscience statues, referred the issue to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services for enforcement.
The $200 million will be disallowed each quarter beginning in January 2021 until California comes into compliance.
“The ERLC continues to advocate for life at every level of the government and will work to ensure that consciences are protected,” it said in an article on its website. “The ERLC stands firmly on the principle that no American should be forced by the state to participate in, pay for, or be complicit in abortion.”
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