Religious Employers Must Cover Birth Control

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius

Because your term of employment should not make you eligible for discrimination.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Many church-affiliated institutions will have to cover free birth control for employees, the Obama administration announced Friday in an election-year move that outraged religious groups, fueling a national debate about the reach of government.

 In a concession, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said nonprofit institutions such as church-affiliated hospitals, colleges and social service agencies will have one additional year to comply with the requirement, issued in regulations under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.  

"I believe this proposal strikes the appropriate balance between respecting religious freedom and increasing access to important preventive services," Sebelius said in a statement. Yet the concession was unlikely to stop a determined effort by opponents to block or overturn the rule. 

If they fail, some predicted that religious employers would simply drop coverage for their workers, opting instead to pay fines to the federal government under the health care law. "Never before has the federal government forced individuals and organizations to go out into the marketplace and buy a product that violates their conscience," said New York Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

"This shouldn't happen in a land where free exercise of religion ranks first in the Bill of Rights." Officials said the administration's ruling was carefully considered, after reviewing more than 200,000 comments from interested parties and the public. 

The one-year extension, they said, responds to concerns raised by religious employers about making adjustments. Administration officials stressed that individual decisions about whether or not to use birth control, and what kind, remain in the hands of women and their doctors.

Full Article: http://news.yahoo.com/feds-religious-employers-must-cover-pill-201745625.html