Tainted Saints

 A little over a week ago, Democrats bent over backwards to appease conservatives in the House by adding the Stupak-Pitt amendment to the health care bill. The amendment imperils access to abortion — a reproductive freedom affirmed by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1973 – by making it illegal for women to use government insurance plans to cover costs associated with an abortion. 

And there is more bad news for women: a George Washington University study released this week indicates that the Stupak amendment could have serious implications for industry-wide coverage of medically-indicated abortions.

But if the GWU study is correct, the Stupak amendment would not simply affect women under the public insurance option — it would affect women covered by private insurance plans, too:

 In view of how the health benefit services industry operates and how insurance product design responds to broad regulatory intervention aimed at reshaping product content, we conclude that the treatment exclusions required under the Stupak/Pitts amendment will have an industry-wide effect, eliminating coverage of medically indicated abortions over time for all women, not only those whose coverage is derived through a health insurance exchange. As a result, Stupak/Pitts can be expected to move the industry away from current norms of coverage for medically indicated abortions.