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The rapid spread of the Zika virus in the Latin America and the Caribbean region, the appearances of cases of Zika in the United States, and the association between Zika infection and serious birth defects has generated attention and concern among the public, policymakers, and the media.
US Appeals Court Rulings on Lawsuits by Nonprofits Objecting to Contraception Download Source Sobel and Salganicoff. 2015.
This report presents state-by-state policies on coverage of key areas in reproductive health for low-income women, including contraception, preconception care, screenings for sexually transmitted diseases and coverage within special state Medicaid family planning programs.
A new Kaiser Family Foundation report finds that donor governments provided US$1.3 billion in bilateral funding for family planning programs in low- and middle-income countries in 2013 – a 19 percent increase from 2012.
This brief analyzes state policies and insurer coverage decisions affecting the availability of abortion coverage in 2015 insurance plans offered through the Marketplaces. It finds that abortion coverage is unavailable in a total of 31 states, 24 of which have enacted laws that ban or restrict abortion coverage in plans sold through their Marketplaces and 7 of which have no abortion coverage restrictions but also have no Marketplace plans offering it.
A Quarter Incorrectly Believes Newly Insured Under ACA Were Enrolled in a Single Government Plan Majority of the Public Believes the Hobby Lobby Decision Will Trigger New Efforts to Deny Health Coverage On Religious Grounds After remaining steady for several months, the share of Americans expressing an unfavorable view of the Affordable Care Act rose…
The Supreme Court is expected to reach a decision by the end of June, 2014 on the cases brought forth by Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties, two for profit corporations challenging the ACA’s contraceptive coverage requirement. The plaintiffs contend that the requirement that they include coverage for certain contraceptive services (emergency contraceptive pills and intrauterine devices) in the insurance plans “substantially burdens” both the corporation’s and the owners’ religious rights. During the arguments, several of the justices discussed the extent to which the corporations did or not did not have a choice in offering coverage to their workers. In this brief, we explore some of the factors influencing coverage decisions and possible consequences for women and employers given possible Supreme Court decision options: either upholding the contraceptive coverage requirement, or in favor of Hobby Lobby.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) requires most private plans to provide coverage for women’s preventive health care, including all prescribed FDA-approved contraceptive services, without cost sharing. To better understand how this provision is being implemented by health plans, Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) staff, with the Lewin Group, reviewed the insurance plan coverage policies for 12 prescribed contraceptive methods (excluding oral contraceptives). This report presents information from 20 different insurance carriers in five states (California, Georgia, Michigan, New Jersey, and Texas) about how they are applying reasonable medical management (RMM) techniques in their coverage of women’s contraceptive services. The different forms of female birth control reviewed in this report include the contraceptive ring, the patch, injections, implants, intrauterine devices (IUDs), and sterilization.
As Medicaid marks its 50th year, the program has unquestionably become the mainstay of health coverage for low-income women in the nation. Since its inception, its role for women has continued to evolve and expand, but the passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) swung open the doors for Medicaid to serve even more low-income women who lack access to private or employer-based insurance. This is because the ACA enabled states to finally eliminate Medicaid's historical “categorical” requirements, which had essentially shut out women and men without dependent children.
This brief examines the implications of a Supreme Court with a solid conservative majority for two abortion cases which have pending requests for review. If the Court chooses to take these cases, abortion laws and who can legally challenge them could be affected in major ways.
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