There have been many attempts to repeal Obamacare or the Affordable Care Act by the Republicans. The latest executive order is a also a big setback for many parts of Obamacare and while the focus should have been to reform and make the existing healthcare better, it seems Republicans are going to continue changing many aspects of the existing healthcare bill through the newly approved tax bill or through further executive orders. Our main concern is how any changes initiated by Republicans in healthcare will affect women in the future.
Planned Parenthood
It is quite possible that the current administration will completely stop funding Planned Parenthood. There are many American women who rely on this fund and completely defunding it for even a year will make life difficult for many of them. The majority of women under Planned Parenthood use its services to prevent unwanted pregnancy. It also initiates about 300,000 breast exams in a single year. Defunding Planned Parenthood will mostly affect women from lower income backgrounds, forcing them to seek expensive reproductive health services elsewhere.
Abortion Cover
The majority of Republicans oppose the practice of abortion and therefore they are more likely to introduce policies against abortion services. The healthcare bills introduced earlier that will prevent women from using any kind of tax credits that the federal government used to give them through insurance plans.
Small business also at times offer insurance coverage for accidental death (do learn what is ad&d), health insurance etc. but they rely on tax breaks. The government is refusing to offer any kind of tax breaks to small businesses that offer their employees abortion coverage. Without these tax breaks, small businesses will no longer be able to afford any kind of abortion coverage for their employees.
The above regulations are not applicable if abortion is necessary to save the mother’s life or in dire cases like rape or incest.
Contraception
Birth control was readily available free of cost under Obamacare or The Affordable Care Act. Contraception came under the pregnancy preventive service and therefore insurance companies were required to cover contraception costs under the healthcare insurance offered to their clients. Republicans have denied that they will change the current contraception mandates specified by Obamacare but changing other mandates are likely to affect access to free birth control. When the majority of women will lose their health insurance then they will also lose access to free birth control. For now it seems the access to contraception is safe because the majority of Republicans support this mandate.
Medicaid
The recent administration has made many cuts to Medicaid and this has affected many Americans. This program provides insurance to about 75 million Americans and the recent cuts are more likely to affect women—especially women from lower income families and women of color who use this program for their various needs.
To give you a perspective, in 2015, Medicaid covered about half of the total births in the US. Major cuts in Medicaid will force women to seek alternative ways to cover the high costs for healthcare.
Maternity Care
Obamacare makes it compulsory for insurance companies that all healthcare plans offered to the clients need to cover certain health benefits like prescription drugs, ambulances and maternity care. The current administration can undo all of these, based on the healthcare bills proposed earlier. They also proposed cuts to Medicaid if the women don’t return to work after sixty days of giving birth. Past evidence show that Republicans are most likely to introduce policies that will make maternity care more elusive and expensive.
The above were some ways women will be affected by any new healthcare bill introduced by the Republicans. We hope this made you more aware of the many health benefits that could be taken away from you under the proposed healthcare bill.