Does your healthcare plan fund abortion? (OneNewsNow.com)

Does your healthcare plan fund abortion?

Jim Brown - OneNewsNow - 5/9/2008 11:00:00 AM

Doctor Leading conservative expert on healthcare reform, Dr. Robert Moffitt, says personal freedom and the preservation of human dignity are the most important issues in the national debate over healthcare.

Dr. Moffitt, former deputy secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services during the Reagan administration, warns that since the healthcare plans of most families are controlled by insurers, employers, or government officials, many Americans are unknowingly being forced to subsidize immoral procedures or unethical treatments.

Now director of the Center for Health Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation, Moffitt recently gave a speech at the Family Research Council on the relationship between healthcare reform and the future of religious liberty in the United States. He urged individuals to find out if their employer-based health plans finance abortion, artificial contraception, or physician-assisted suicide.

"Forty-six percent of workers today in employer-based health insurance finance abortion. I think this is critical. Many of you know people who consider themselves very good, solid citizens [and] who consider themselves pro-life. They go to church on Sunday; but on Monday morning, they finance abortion. They don't know they finance abortion, they do not conscientiously do it -- but they do do it. And they do it through private health insurance. They do it because the plan covers it," Moffitt pointed out.

stethoscope Moffitt also notes that 86 percent of employer-sponsored plans cover artificial contraception. He advocates three policies to restore patients' freedom of conscience: fixing the federal tax code to create fairness in health coverage; offering values-driven healthcare plans; and eliminating barriers to purchasing health plans across state lines. He believes there needs to be a national consumer-driven market for health insurance.

"Why not have a market that looks like the market for every other good or service in our society?" he asked. "At the state level, why not have just a single market? A single market which would cover everybody, where employers would be allowed to make a defined contribution to any healthcare plan that employees wish to choose -- and allow the plans to compete directly for employees' dollars. New plans could be sponsored by association plans, fraternal organizations, ethnic or religious or faith-based organizations," Moffitt contended.

The Heritage Foundation spokesman supports targeted tax credits for individual and family healthcare coverage, and advocates what he calls a "radical new way" of looking at health insurance with ethical and moral considerations.