Protect Women's Health

Floor Speech

Mrs. HAGAN. Mr. President, I rise in support of the Protect Women's Health From Corporate Interference Act, to stand up for what I thought was a commonly shared value--that a woman's health care decisions are between her and her doctor, not her and her boss. I thought that was well-established, straightforward--simple, even.

But it turns out that the majority of the Supreme Court thought differently when it came to certain kinds of health care decisions: whether a woman would have access to contraceptives without copays as guaranteed by Federal law. As we all know now, 2 weeks ago the Supreme Court held in Hobby Lobby that an employer's personal beliefs can trump some of the most private and significant health care decisions a woman makes.

So let me be very clear on where I stand: What kind of birth control a female employee uses is not her boss's business.

I have heard some of the supporters of the Supreme Court decision argue that ruling is a narrow ruling, and that it only applies to closely held family businesses. That doesn't tell the whole story because just 3 days after this ruling in Hobby Lobby the Court said that a nonprofit religious college didn't have to comply with a contraceptive coverage requirement even though it had already had an accommodation that allowed it to avoid paying for such coverage itself.

The majority even pointed to this accommodation in the Hobby Lobby ruling as an example of a less restrictive alternative that could be open to for-profit businesses. A few days later that same accommodation wasn't good enough.

In her dissent Justice Sotomayor wrote:

Those who are bound by our decisions usually believe that they can take us at our word. Not so today.

In other words, in less than a week the Supreme Court's conservative majority went from issuing a supposedly narrow ruling to potentially broadening it to encompass a new class of institutions. The impact of the ruling in Hobby Lobby will most definitely not be limited to those closely held businesses, as some say. I have heard others argue, in essence: Don't worry. The ruling doesn't expressly ban access to contraceptives. It just shifts the additional cost of the coverage back to the women.

But those who say erecting a barrier of cost between a woman and birth control will give her the same access she had before the decision don't understand what women have to go through to get covered and don't understand the many reasons why women use birth control. Since the coverage requirement went into effect last year, the number of women who got their birth control without a copay jumped from 14 percent to 56 percent. That means some serious costs were avoided for many women.

The average annual savings for women last year was $269. In total, women in the United States saved $483 million on contraceptives, thanks to the Affordable Care Act. Among those women were 917,000 in North Carolina alone who were eligible for preventive services without additional copays. Many of these women sought and used birth control medications for reasons that had absolutely nothing to do with planning pregnancy. In fact, oral contraceptives are a key treatment for at least three major medical conditions that affect women. Polycystic ovary syndrome affects 5 to 10 percent of women of reproductive age, and if left untreated can lead to the development of ovarian cysts or infertility. In addition, 11 percent of women are affected by endometriosis in their lifetime, and 40,000 women each year are diagnosed with endometrial cancer. Many women are at risk of developing ovarian cancer--one of the most deadly cancers in the United States--and women with ovarian cancer also can receive treatment via birth control. And yes, one of the best known ways to reduce the risk of these conditions is birth control.

Employers who make their female employees pay out of pocket for contraceptives aren't just imposing their personal beliefs, they are also making it more difficult for women to access important lifesaving medical treatment.

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Mrs. HAGAN. That is why I believe it is so important to debate and to pass the Protect Women's Health From Corporate Interference Act. This bill would fix the Hobby Lobby decision by making it illegal for any company to deny their workers specific health benefits, including birth control, that would be required to be covered. It would make clear that bosses cannot discriminate against their female workers and would ensure equal treatment under the law for tens of thousands of workers for which coverage hangs in the balance. It would preserve and codify the existing accommodation for our nonprofit religious employees.

It is troubling to me that in 2014 we are even debating women's access to contraception. Nearly all women--99 percent--will use it at some point in their lives, and they should have access to safe, effective birth control if they choose to use it--plain and simple.

This bill would ensure that those decisions about an employee's health can stay between the woman and her doctor, not between the woman and her boss. I urge my colleagues to support the bill.

Thank you, Mr. President, and I yield the floor.

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