[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 47 (Wednesday, March 21, 2012)]
[House]
[Page H1440]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


               WOMEN'S HEALTH AND THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT

  (Ms. DeLAURO asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. DeLAURO. Madam Speaker, among the many beneficial reforms for 
women in the Affordable Care Act passed 2 years ago this week is an end 
to the discriminatory practice of gender rating in which individual 
women are charged more than men for the same coverage. We know for a 
fact that these sorts of discriminatory policies are not something that 
insurers would just change on their own.
  According to a report that the National Women's Law Center released 
earlier this week, over 90 percent of the best-selling plans in States 
that have not already banned gender rating still charge women more than 
men for the very same coverage. This costs women and their families 
approximately $1 billion a year. Because we fought--and we fought hard 
2 years ago--gender rating will be a thing of the past in 2014. At long 
last, a woman's health will be put on equal footing with that of her 
spouse, her son, or her brother.
  This is just one of the many benefits for women in the Affordable 
Care Act. I could not be more proud to have helped pass this piece of 
legislation, which will transform women's health in this country.

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