Ca Legislation Would Require Insurance for Gay “Infertility”

National Review ^ | April 6, 2013 | Wesley J. Smith

[markomalley]

Leave it to my state of California to head off in radical and expensive directions. Legislation has been filed that would require group insurance to cover gay and lesbian infertility treatments just as they do heterosexual. But, as I note elsewhere, AB 460 isn’t limited to a finding of actual infertility. Nor does it require that gays and lesbians have tried to conceive or sire a child using heterosexual means, natural or artificial. Rather–as with heterosexual couples–merely the inability to get pregnant for a year while having active sexual relations is sufficient to demonstrate need for treatment, meaning if the bill becomes law, it would require insurance companies to pay for services such as artificial insemination, surrogacy, etc. for people who are actually fecund. Indeed, since the bill prevents discrimination based on marital or domestic partnership status, theoretically every gay and lesbian in the state could be deemed infertile for purposes of insurance coverage merely by the fact that they don’t wish to engage in heterosexual relations.

That’s no way to contain health care costs! Moreover, I note that health care law is being used these days to promote social agendas other than access to a doctor, and I give examples, including the Free Birth Control Rule under Obamacare. I conclude my column with a warning:

Remembering that what happens in California doesn’t stay in California, it is easy to imagine Health and Human Services secretary Kathleen Sebelius holding a press conference to announce that henceforth, all insurance policies will be required to cover infertility treatments, “without discrimination on the basis of age, ancestry, color, disability, domestic partner status, gender, gender expression, gender identity, genetic information, marital status, national origin, race, religion, sex, or sexual orientation.” Indeed, it is probably a matter not of “whether,” but of “when.”

Imagine the bank busting possibilities!

[markomalley]

California AB 460:

An act to amend Section 1374.55 of the Health and Safety Code, and to amend Section 10119.6 of the Insurance Code, relating to health care coverage.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST

AB 460, as introduced, Ammiano. Health care coverage: infertility.

(1) Existing law, the Knox-Keene Health Care Service Plan Act of 1975, provides for the regulation of health care service plans by the Department of Managed Health Care and makes a willful violation of the act a crime. Existing law provides for the regulation of health insurers by the Department of Insurance. Existing law also imposes various requirements and restrictions on health care service plans and health insurers, including, among other things, a requirement that every health care service plan contract or health insurance policy that is issued, amended, or renewed on or after January 1, 1990, offer coverage for the treatment of infertility, except in vitro fertilization, under those terms and conditions as may be agreed upon between the group subscriber or the group policyholder and the plan or the insurer, except as provided.

This bill would require that the coverage for the treatment of infertility be offered and provided without discrimination on the basis of age, ancestry, color, disability, domestic partner status, gender, gender expression, gender identity, genetic information, marital status, national origin, race, religion, sex, or sexual orientation. Because a willful violation of the bill’s provisions by a health care service plan would be a crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program.

(2) The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.

This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.

Digest Key

Vote: MAJORITY   Appropriation: NO   Fiscal Committee: YES   Local Program: YES  

I'm certain it's already buried deep in some classified HHS regulation.

Sigh.

[SMM48]

The state is a fiscal disaster and the CA legislature is attacking the problems in order of priority.

What an f-ing joke!

[Gaffer]

It is much much more than a joke I’m afraid.

I can only sum it up as this: “They think themselves God.”

IOW. They need only wish (legislate) it so and is shall be, regardless of resource, facility or repercussions.

[cincinnati65]

Every day, I bang my head up against the wall, and after a year I’m STILL not a millionaire, which causes me a great deal of stress. Guess health insurance should take care of that too.

[Christie at the beach]

Liberalism, it destroys everything it meets.

[muawiyah]

There goes the neighborhood!

[Jumper]

Doesn’t Kalifornia have laws now about moving out of state, especially if you are money-maker.... Too bad that even fines won’t keep folks in the bear state forever.

[mosesdapoet]

When this first popped up I thought it was satire.
What gets me is that there are no names attached to the postings I’ve seen thus far on CA AB420. I assume this is an assembly bill. OK who’s sponsoring it? And who are its co-sponsors? Where are their districts and do any CA FRs live in them?

[G Larry]

“Gay Infertility” is a natural condition, requiring no remedy.

THAT is how insurance companies should respond, in their quest for cost control.

[mosesdapoet]

correction that’s AB 460 not 420.

[jsanders2001]

When is that state supposed to collapse into the sea, again? Not soon enough obviously. What is wrong with those people (overall, I know there’s a few good ones but damn overall it seems to be a nuthouse state)?

[Vigilanteman]

Just when I think California has reached the height of total lunacy, they go over the bar again . . .

[Rusty0604]

And the gov’t response would be that it's a preexisting condition. This whole thing os so that gay couples won't have to pay for artificial insemination out of their own pockets.

[G Larry]

It is NOT a “condition”!

It is a NATURAL STATE!

It is NOT Possible for Party A, to inseminate Party B, under any circumstance.

Inusrance does not cover, and should not cover introduction of a third party surogate!

[G Larry]

Words mean things!

Infertile has a meaning.

ROCKS are NOT “infertile”, as they have no nautural ability to be fertile!

[Rusty0604]

The liberals change the definition of everything to suit their goals. If they hadn’t changed the meaning of the word “insurance” we wouldn’t even be discussing this insanity.

[a fool in paradise]

The “Buy me a baby daddy and rent me a womb” bill.

Give them a “sex change” operation and if at first they don’t conceive, try try again.

[a fool in paradise]

FRANCIS: Yeah. I think Judith’s point of view is very valid, Reg, provided the Movement never forgets that it is the inalienable right of every man...

FRANCIS: Or woman... to rid himself

STAN: Or herself.

FRANCIS: Or herself.

REG: Agreed.

FRANCIS: Thank you, brother.

STAN: Or sister.

FRANCIS: Or sister. Where was I?

REG: I think you'd finished.

FRANCIS: Oh. Right.

REG: Furthermore, it is the birthright of every man

STAN: Or woman.

REG: Why don’t you shut up about women, Stan. You';re putting us off.

STAN: Women have a perfect right to play a part in our movement, Reg.

FRANCIS: Why are you always on about women, Stan?

STAN: I want to be one.

REG: What?

STAN: I want to be a woman. From now on, I want you all to call me "Loretta".

REG: What?!!

LORETTA: It's my right as a man.

JUDITH: Well, why do you want to be Loretta, Stan?

LORETTA: I want to have babies.

REG: You want to have babies?!

LORETTA: It's every man's right to have babies if he wants them.

REG: But... you can't have babies.

LORETTA: Don't you oppress me.

REG: I'm not oppressing you, Stan. You haven't got a womb! Where's the foetus going to gestate?! You going to keep it in a box?!

LORETTA: [crying]

JUDITH: Here! I've got an idea. Suppose you agree that he can't actually have babies, not having a womb, which is nobody's fault, not even the Romans;, but that he can have the right to have babies.

FRANCIS: Good idea, Judith. We shall fight the oppressors for your right to have babies, brother. Sister. Sorry.

REG: What's the point?

FRANCIS: What?

REG: What's the point of fighting for his right to have babies when he can't have babies?!

FRANCIS: It is symbolic of our struggle against oppression.

REG: Symbolic of his struggle against reality.

< /PYTHON >