Are oral contraceptives healthcare?

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My fiance is very angry to mandate that oral contraceptives should be paid for by health insurance. I feel it is a woman's right, and it is a medication, in additional to medical uses besides preventing pregnancy. But is it a health care issue to prevent pregnancy, like a medication that treats a disease, such as insulin? Or is that beside the point, because it is a choice? It is a useful medication for the personal choice of deciding when and if a woman will conceive. It will save millions of dollars in healthcare for the cost of unwanted deliveries, illnesses during pregnancy, not to mention the savings for raising children, their healthcare and education. Your respectful opinions are appreciated.

Specializes in ICU, PACU, OR.

Yes I understand about equal opportunity employment, but I do know that there is college in GA that prohibited gay or those who have committed adultery from being an employee at that college. The law stood with the right of the religious based college that was based on their religious beliefs, so there are some things that religious based employers that prohibit just anyone from being hired.

The federal law steps in when federal benefits are paid out or used as profit by employers. Since alot of people accept medicare and medicaid funding, fed loans etc, then the federal law must be followed. So much indigent care, etc.

Those entities that keep the gov't out can do whatever they want based on their religious beliefs.

Why should you pay for anything you don't believe in, but you do everyday through your taxes.

Your tax dollars go for more things that should tick you off than contraception efforts. Really, you pay for alot of things that people don't responsibly choose. At least contraception would limit the unplanned pregnancies that you may pay benefits for through free prenatal care, uninsured care, funds for food stamps, milk and gov't cheese.

OK, have you ever LIVED in a place with socialized medicine or "healthcare for all"? I have, and folks, it aint pretty! I am 41 and was born in Canada. When I was born, there was no, "Will you breast feed or bottle feed"? It was "You WILL breast feed, wheather you (or your body) wants to!" My mother produced no milk, and for weeks, I barely ate. Nurses at this time made home visits to all new mothers. When my mother, sleep-deprived and worried sick about my not being able to eat, the nurse told her I looked "too healthy" to have not had any formula (which was only available by RX) and searched the house for contriband formula! This is not science fiction, or an isolated incident. I was hospitilzed a day later for failure to thrived due to my mother's inability to produce milk because she had been so sick during her pregnancy. Having formula without a RX was a jailable offence like buying oxy on the street corner!

And death panels? How about being told how many cancer treatments you can have? My father, who lived in Toronto, was diagnosed with AML in 1998. He had chemo, radiation and a BMT. When, during a routine exam they found a cancerous tumor again, he was told, "You have had your allotted treatments." That's right. Allotted treatments. For the record, he was 55. He was then transferred to a hospital closer to his home, and died a month later.

I too, am an ER nurse, and I too, struggle with my medical bills, but at least I'm allowed to go to the doctors I want. In Canada, there are waiting lists for YEARS just to get a GP or an OB. Think I'm making this up? Just do 5 minutes of research. Thank your lucky stars you even have the option to run up bills. My dad didn't even have a choice in the matter.

In Scotland, the nurse in the ER decides if you are even sick enough to see the MD. Miscarriage? Well, as we know, before 20 wks we can't do anything anyway, so why see the MD? OR waste the money to see you in the ER, as we won't "fix" anything. If the bleeding won't stop after 2 days, come back and then you might get to see the MD.

As Americans, we have it so good, we don't even know how good we have it! Even the poorest of our poor are still better off than 80% of the rest of the world, who live on about 50 cents a day. Perhaps we should count our blessings just a bit more??

Why is nobody outraged that the only "cure" that male researchers have come up with for female hormonal imbalance and acne is a drug that shuts down an entire bodily system? This sends the clear message that female fertility is a nuisance, not a life-affirming gift.

BTW, I was exposed to this attitude by a very crunchy, organic-loving hippie friend of mine. She makes a lot of sense.

I guess that isn't the college Newt Gingrich worked at

Specializes in Critical Care.
MunoRN,That the Republicans had ANY input into the Affordable Care Act is just a complete lie.I am not sure if your memory is short or mine is long but it was not that long ago. It was a closed door meeting of Democrats that developed it and the Speaker actually made the statement "You will have to pass the bill to see what is in it. They passed the legislation along party lines so quickly that it was impossible for it to be read in the time between its inception and it being passed. "

Pelosi did say that for Americans to really understand the Healthcare reform bill they would need to see it in action, she was not making a statement that it would not be publicly available until after it was passed, as it was available months before the senate vote and the final vote in the house.

The bill that would eventually become the Affordable Care Act was written by the Senate Finance Committee and the Finance Subcommittee on healthcare. The Senate Finance Committee had 11 republicans and 13 democrats, the subcommittee was made up of 7 Republicans and 9 Democrats. While the bill was being written, numerous round tables/town meetings etc, including 31 Bipartisan meetings over the course of 3 months that was the basis for much of the bill. The rough draft of the bill was released September 16th and the version to be voted on was released on October 13th, the vote was not until December 24th, which means there was more than 2 months to read the bill, most of which had already been announced long before the draft was released. The House then had another 3 months to read the bill before voting.

Even the Democrats would not pass it until a boatload of shenanigans,promises and outright payoffs were put into play.The more I see of the act the more I can see why they had to do it that way.Nobody in their right mind would have passed this.(Explains a lot)

I'm not sure why you think this ended up as some sort of Democratic dream of healthcare reform. We're socialist patsies remember? We wanted universal healthcare where patchouli and marijuana are the only approved treatments for anything.

While most Democrats did realize that Universal Healthcare wasn't going to happen, If democrats really had complete (or really any) control we'd have single-payer system or at least a public option, yet all we ended up with was better access to preventative care for a very small group of people, and potentially made it a bit more difficult for insurers to drop people because they end getting sick and actually need the insurance they've been paying for. As it stands we still have a system based on for-profit insurers who's overhead runs 12% and up, compared to medicare and medicaid that have an overhead of about 2% for doing the same job. Obama wanted strong bipartisan support and made all sorts of concessions that added Billions to the original estimates (mainly by getting rid of cost-saving measures) in order to get Republican votes even though he didn't need them, yet though in the end Republicans still didn't vote for it and it almost didn't pass because Democrats didn't like it either (since it had essentially become everything Republicans would want in "reform" short of just doing nothing.

Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.
OK, have you ever LIVED in a place with socialized medicine or "healthcare for all"?

*** Yes and it was wonderful. My children and I hold dual citizenship, US & New Zealand. My children & I have been patients in NZs socialized health care system. The care was exceptionaly high qualiety and very inexpensive. Our bill for 3 days of inpatient care for my son was $36. I watched my grandmother in law go from independantly living alone to passing away in a palliative care unit over the course of about 10 years. She was alwasy well cared for and treated with great dignity. The night she fell and broke her hip she went directly the the hospital and had surgery the next morning.

On top of all that I paid less in taxes as a percentage of my income in New Zealand than I do now in the USA.

Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.
And religion aside,Why should I have to pay for YOUR contraception?

For the same reason I am happy to assist in paying for your health care needs. And also for the exact same reason I help pay for our defence, cause we all benifit.

Specializes in L & D; Postpartum.

Not all insurances pay for Viagra. It depends on the company, and why it is being prescribed. For example, my husband had a prostatectomy in 2007 and because his erections were partially diminished, Viagra was prescribed. But our very good insurance program doesn't pay for erectile dysfunction drugs or devices is post prostatectomy. Please amend any statements about Viagra being provided with the word "sometimes". Just like sometimes birth control is covered. No requirement for either should be mandated.

Specializes in Maternal - Child Health.
*** Yes and it was wonderful. My children and I hold dual citizenship, US & New Zealand. My children & I have been patients in NZs socialized health care system. The care was exceptionaly high qualiety and very inexpensive. Our bill for 3 days of inpatient care for my son was $36. I watched my grandmother in law go from independantly living alone to passing away in a palliative care unit over the course of about 10 years. She was alwasy well cared for and treated with great dignity. The night she fell and broke her hip she went directly the the hospital and had surgery the next morning.

On top of all that I paid less in taxes as a percentage of my income in New Zealand than I do now in the USA.

Perhaps their systems of taxation, healthcare delivery and payment should be studied and trialed here.

But you indicate that you already pay more in taxes here than you did in NZ, and the bulk of Obamacare isn't figured in yet. How can we possibly expect the high quality, low cost healthcare that they have, given that this law does nothing to change the multitude of flaws in our health care delivery system and will significantly increase healthcare expenses as well as taxes?

Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.

perhaps their systems of taxation, healthcare delivery and payment should be studied and trialed here.

*** i doubt it would work here since it depends on a very high level of personal responsibiliety among citizens. i am 100% convinsed that free, or nearly free health care is the way to go and can (is) be made to work. that is not the same as saying that our (us)government can make it work.

but you indicate that you already pay more in taxes here than you did in nz, and the bulk of obamacare isn't figured in yet. how can we possibly expect the high quality, low cost healthcare that they have, given that this law does nothing to change the multitude of flaws in our health care delivery system and will significantly increase healthcare expenses as well as taxes?

*** your question is pretty far off topic and is unrelated to any of my comments. fwiw i consider the health care bill to be shill to insurance companies since they benifit from it the most.

Specializes in Maternal - Child Health.

You seem to be advocating a system that you acknowledge probably won't work here due to the entitlement mentality of the American people.

One of those "entitlements" is free contraception, which isn't really free at all, just costs passed on to everyone but the person using it.

Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.

you seem to be advocating a system that you acknowledge probably won't work here due to the entitlement mentality of the american people.

*** wow, how you could come to that totaly inaccurate conclusion based on my comments is suprising and amazing to me. i did not say or imply that americans had an entitlement mentality. in fact i don't believe that to be the case at all. quite the opposit in my opinion. the reason it won't work, in my opinion is due two things. the lack of personal responsibiliety among americans, and (the biggest reason) the general incompetence of our government.

one of those "entitlements" is free contraception, which isn't really free at all, just costs passed on to everyone but the person using it.

*** that may be your opinion but i certainly do not share it.

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