The numbers of teen births and abortions have dropped dramatically over the last several decades thanks to the prevalence and easy access to birth control measures.
Most women like being able to determine if and when they are ready to have children, and don’t view birth control as an affront to their religion.
The Obama Administration agrees both with a woman’s reproductive rights and with the fact that birth control has helped reduce unwanted births.
Thus, in the design of the Affordable Care Act was included the provision that businesses include the cost of birth control in their health insurance plans.
On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that closely held companies can abstain from the coverage if they say it violates their religious leanings.
Two companies, Hobby Lobby, a nationwide chain of 500 arts-and-crafts stores, and Conestoga Wood Specialities, a custom cabinet manufacturer, brought forth the suit.
Attorneys for the two companies said paying for certain kinds of birth control for their female employees violates their religious beliefs. Specifically, they are against any measure that prevents a fertilized egg from implanting in a woman’s uterus, such as an intrauterine device (IUD), which they regard as a form of abortion. About 6 percent of U.S. women use an IUD.
The decision opens the floodgates for other privately held companies to all of a sudden “find religion” in an effort to curb costs.
To date, more than 70 other companies are in line with similar suits.
Also, the designation “closely held” can have broad interpretation. The court’s intention is a company with a limited number of shareholders, which in reality could include Walmart and Koch Industries. Privately held companies employ more than half of all employees in the U.S. marketplace.
BIRTH CONTROL typically costs $15-$50 a month, depending on the measure and whether it is covered by insurance.
As Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg pointed out in her dissent, “Women of childbearing age spend 68 percent more in out-of-pocket health care costs than men.”
For most women, birth control is a necessary cost and they work it into their budgets.
But for those with limited means, the fact that for the first time ever it has been covered 100 percent by health insurance has been a true boon.
Today, about 90 percent of American women in their childbearing years, 15-44, use birth control.
The typical woman wants only two children, according to the Guttmacher Institute. To achieve this, she must use contraceptives for roughly 30 years.
These are not wanton women. They are Iola’s mothers, daughters and sisters.
And neither their employers nor the U.S. government should be interfering with decisions of such a private nature.
— Susan Lynn
