The coverage of birth control goes beyond the purpose of insurance. Insurance covers risks, not inevitabilities, thus they don't cover preexisting conditions or birth control. The article you quote makes my point for me, saying, "For decades, women's rights advocates have battled for contraceptive coverage as a simple necessity of health and well being." Although I agree that birth control is a health care necessity, so is eating well, and yet insurance doesn't cover quality food. Fertility and the need to do something about it is, for almost all women, an inevitability, not a risk. Just as everyone needs to eat well "as a simple necessity of health and well being," so also do all women need a healthy way to prevent pregnancy. That doesn't mean insurance should cover these things, in fact it means they shouldn't. You pay for things you know you are going to need like food and birth control, you are insured for things you hope you don't ever need (like Viagra). Also the male bias the article asserts is just absurd, my insurance doesn't cover the condoms I use for birth control either (I'm a male BTW). If you want me to pay for your birth control, at least be honest and just tax me for it instead of sneaking it into my insurance costs while pretending it costs nothing or only hurts insurance company profits.
Fundamentally speaking, you're dead wrong in two areas:
1) The fact is that your birth control is over the counter and hers is a prescription. If the FDA is going to require that a prescription be necessary for purchasing the pill/ring/patch/etc, then insurance should cover a portion of it just as they do with every other prescription like (ahem) viagra. Especially considering that statistically hers are much more effective.
2) You're kind of ignoring the difference between getting pregnant, and getting SOMEONE ELSE pregnant. Which hopefully i don't have to explain in any more detail, even though we're both guys.
Commenting by HaloScan
