Pitter Pat
My Current Mood:


ON CAPITOL HILL: Insurers would have to cover infertility treatment under maternity coverage under Senate Bill 221, approved Monday by the Senate Health and Human Services Committee. Though described by sponsoring Sen. Ed Mayne, D-West Valley, as "a family bill -- it's to help those who are trying to have families" -- SB221 was opposed by the Utah Manufacturers Association as a costly mandate to employers offering health insurance.
Courtesy of the Salt Lake Tribune

Okay. I have a couple of problems with this.

If an insurance company is made to cover infertility treatments, bonus. But where is the other side of that spectrum (or speculum, as the case may be) and the mandate for insurance companies to cover birth control? If we are encouraging people to have babies through their medical coverage benefits, shouldn’t we also encourage population control for those who do not wish to have children? It’s a lot less expensive to pay for birth control shots or pills than the money it takes to carry a child to term in a healthy manner, or to assist a patient who may have complications from an abortion.

I am really feeling the balance shift in this state. I already knew that those people who choose to have children in Zion are of the Utah Elite – more considerations in the workplace, etc. Now, the Legislature wants to make businesses and employers and THE REST OF US pay higher medical insurance premiums so Moroni’s Flock can reproduce at will. Yea.

Secondly, you can bet dollars to binki’s that the benefit will not include artificial insemination for single, partnered or lesbian women. Oh, no. That won’t happen here… so goes even more discrimination. If you are married and begging to fill your house with morally upstanding children (and future taxpayers), let the rest of the State pay for it.

Yippee.

I can’t get excited over Legislation that makes me pay for services I have no chance of ever receiving. Or, as in Toni’s case, who never want to receive. So, does that mean we should get some sort of consolation prize? Oh, yeah, we did already. The right to live in a Petty, Fake State.

I just hate the prospect of the government telling us how and when we can breed and have it paid for. That get's scary, if you ask me.

No, go forth and procreate!

By the way, an edited version of this entry was sent to the Salt Lake Tribune. Let's see if they have the guts to print it.