[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 41 (Friday, March 19, 2010)]
[House]
[Page H1719]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1900
                      WOMEN AND HEALTH CARE REFORM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, the entire Nation is counting on us to pass 
comprehensive health care reform. The millions who have no coverage at 
all desperately need this legislation, but so too do those Americans 
who are insured and are being squeezed out by outrageous premiums. So 
do the businesses that are less profitable because they will be 
buckling under the weight of high health care costs. But above all, 
American women need us to do the right thing this week and overhaul the 
health care system.
  Mr. Speaker, in ways both overt and beneath the radar, the current 
system discriminates against women. The health care reform bill with 
the corrections bill prohibits insurance companies from refusing 
coverage or charging higher premiums based on a preexisting condition. 
And the fact is being a woman is a preexisting condition.
  There are documented cases in which pregnancy was treated as a 
preexisting condition, with women denied the very basic prenatal care 
benefits that they needed. On other occasions, women have been socked 
with a huge hospital bill following a C-section because their insurance 
company would not cover the procedure which is used roughly one out of 
every three births in the United States.
  And here is the most outrageous and unconscionable one of all. In 
several States, a woman who has endured domestic violence may also be 
out of luck when she goes to file a claim because domestic violence is 
defined by many of the large insurance companies as a preexisting 
condition. Talk about adding insult to injury. Literally, Sorry, ma'am, 
you're on your own. We can't pay to wire that broken jaw because it was 
given to you by your husband. Next time you get a facial injury, make 
sure it is from tripping or falling; then we might be able to help you. 
This is the health care equivalent of telling a rape victim she has no 
case because she was asking for it.
  There's more. Systemic forces and biological realities conspire to 
make the health care crisis that much more severe for women. Because of 
their reproductive health needs, women, especially young women relative 
to their male peers, simply need to visit their doctor more often on 
average.
  Women are less likely to have full-time jobs with large companies so 
they are less likely to qualify for employer-based coverage. That puts 
them at the mercy of the very expensive individual insurance market 
where women are at a disadvantage because they earn less. Thanks to the 
fact that women earn 78 cents for every dollar a man brings home, they 
are poorer. Many of the policies on the individual insurance market, 71 
percent of them according to one study, don't offer comprehensive 
maternity services at all.
  And thanks to a practice known as gender rating, many women are 
essentially assessed an estrogen penalty when they sign up for health 
care coverage. Insurance companies are allowed to charge women more 
simply because they are women.
  The legislation before us will close these disparities and correct 
these injustices. We should all be ashamed of a broken system that 
marginalizes more than half of our population. We have to stop putting 
health insurance company profits ahead of healthy American women. Let's 
answer history's call and pass health care reform.

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