Sanity in Sight? Congresswomen Push for Gender Equality in Health-Care Reform

By Carole Joffe, Ms. Washington Correspondent

At a Democratic Women’s Working Group press event in front of the Capitol, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and other Congresswomen decried the sexist, irrational and often cruel health care system with which American women now contend, and vowed to pass legislation to fix it.

“We will be finalizing a bill soon [that] will address the issue that women are charged nearly 50 percent more than men for the same coverage when they purchase insurance in the individual market," said the Speaker. "We will eliminate co-pays and deductibles for recommended preventive services--such as early screenings, mammograms, well baby care, well child care, and maternity services. ... [Under the current system] if you have ever had a C-section, [it's a] pre-existing medical condition. ... That will all be gone under this legislation.”

The legislation—H.R. 3200—would address the gross failures of the current system, particularly when it comes to women. No more "gender rating," the practice of charging women up to 140% for the same coverage as men (which Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, co-chair of the Congressional Women’s Caucus, called "ugly. ")  No more denying coverage for pre-existing conditions. Coverage for maternity care, currently missing from 79 percent of health plans. Coverage for preventive care. And subsidies for those unable to purchase their own insurance.

“The women’s movement has worked to eliminate sex-discrimination in health insurance for 40 years, and at last this reform would eliminate it,” said Feminist Majority President Eleanor Smeal, who also spoke at the event.

Evoking the old feminist saying “the personal is political," the Congresswomen effortlessly moved between the details of health care legislation and anecdotes from their own lives. Critiquing the fact that pregnancy—past or current—is enough for some insurance plans to refuse coverage, Speaker Pelosi told the crowd that she, who has given birth to five children, was told by insurers at one point that she was “a poor risk” because of her previous pregnancies. Her response? “I thought that I proved my strength!”

The Congresswomen cited other examples of "pre-existing conditions," such as C-sections, that affect only women. Most appallingly, in eight states and the District of Columbia, a history of domestic violence is legitimate grounds for insurers to reject a woman’s application for health coverage. Congresswoman Donna Edwards of Maryland could not have put it better: “Domestic violence is a crime, not a pre-existing condition!”

All of these Congresswomen vigorously support a public option for health care—a proposal that has been relentlessly demonized by many conservatives. Congresswoman Gwen Moore of Wisconsin, the other co-chair of the Congressional Women’s Caucus, told of her need for public health care when she become pregnant as an impoverished 18-year-old: “Thanks to a government program, Medicaid, I was able to have a healthy pregnancy.”

Most poignantly, Congresswomen Mary Jo Kilroy of Ohio spoke of her own diagnosis of multiple sclerosis (MS), wanting “to put a face on what it means to have a chronic illness.” Congresswoman Kilroy acknowledged her personal good fortune to have sufficient insurance coverage, but spoke compassionately of the thousands with this disease (far more likely to strike women than men) who do not. She cited a health care system “that is not even close to being fair,” pointing to both the cruelty and shortsightedness of insurance plans that deny early treatment to those with MS: “They should get early treatment before the onset of disability, before they have to go into nursing homes, before their costs end up being much higher.”

In the health care field, as in so many other areas of American life, racial disparities compound gender ones. Congresswoman Edwards pointed out that African American women are both less likely than white women to be diagnosed with breast cancer and considerably more likely to die from it. Congresswoman Moore, who represents an impoverished community in Milwaukee, put it bluntly: “If the African American community in Wisconsin were a country, we’d be 66th in the world in infant mortality.”

The ultimate fate of health-care reform is unknown at this very volatile moment in American politics. But the case Speaker Pelosi and her colleagues make for reform is unassailable.
 
For more on women and health care reform, see the new Feminist Majority Foundation website, Health Insurance and Women.