The New Health-Care Fight: Abortion Coverage in State Exchanges

While the congressional fight over health-care reform has wrapped up and legislators moved on, a new, state-level battle over abortion coverage has just begun. Section 1303 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (page 779 here) reiterates states’ rights to regulate abortion coverage among their insurers: “A state may elect to prohibit abortion coverage in qualified health plans offered through an Exchange in such State if such State enacts a law to provide for such a prohibition.” This provision actually does not give states any rights they didn’t have before. Newsweek blog