Bishops Attack Abortion Coverage in Health Plan

The nation’s Roman Catholic bishops Wednesday announced a massive grass-roots campaign to eliminate abortion coverage from health care reform legislation, saying that they are willing to sacrifice their longtime support for universal coverage--and fight against reform--if Congress includes abortions in a standard benefits package.

“We cannot compromise on this,” Bishop James T. McHugh of Camden, N.J., said at a press conference here.

The mobilization of millions of church members to call and write their representatives deals another blow to the prospects of significant congressional action on health care reform this year.

The bishops’ announcement was made as the Times Mirror Center for the People & the Press released a poll that found that the public opposes abortion coverage in a federally guaranteed benefits package by a margin of 68% to 26%.

The announcement and the poll served as a reminder that President Clinton is fighting an uphill battle on multiple fronts, each made up of shifting alliances that support him on some issues but oppose him on others.

For instance, with the notable exception of abortion coverage, Clinton’s reform agenda and that of the Catholic Health Assn. are remarkably similar.

Shortly after the bishops’ news conference, abortion-rights activists vowed to step up their fight for mandatory coverage, noting that abortions are already covered by most private insurance plans.

“We can’t support a plan that takes us backwards, that marginalizes women,” said Rep. Nita M. Lowey (D-N.Y.).

The White House has made a similar argument, but the extent to which the President and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton are prepared to fight to preserve abortion coverage is unclear.

They signaled their awareness that abortion looms as a potential health care deal-breaker last month when Hillary Clinton publicly backed off from her previous unequivocal support for mandatory abortion coverage by saying that it is “very difficult to tell exactly” how the issue will be resolved.

In letters to Democratic congressional leaders who are now trying to fashion a compromise health care reform bill in each chamber for a floor vote, the bishops made clear their unyielding opposition to any requirement that health care plans provide for abortions.

“We promise our vigorous opposition to any legislation that includes them,” said the letter, copies of which were sent to Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell (D-Me.) and House Speaker Thomas S. Foley (D-Wash.).

The letter was signed by Archbishop William H. Keeler of Baltimore, president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops; Cardinal Roger M. Mahony of Los Angeles, chairman of the conference’s Pro-Life Committee; and Bishop John H. Ricard of Baltimore, chairman of the conference’s Domestic Policy Committee.

They said mandatory abortion coverage would “force millions of employers, churches, and individuals to subsidize abortion in violation of their consciences.”

Like a proposed increase in the tobacco tax, abortion coverage poses a tough challenge for Mitchell and Foley. To pass comprehensive health care reform, they must come up with ways to finesse each issue in order to maximize support among lawmakers with deeply held convictions, whose support seems vital if there is to be reform.

On Capitol Hill, abortion-rights advocates released a letter, signed by 72 House members, calling on Foley to keep abortion coverage in the health care legislation.

“The idea that certain health care benefits should not be covered if some people find them politically, morally or religiously unacceptable defeats the whole idea of comprehensive health care,” the letter said.

Implicit in such rhetoric is the threat by many members that they will vote against health care reform, depending on whether abortion coverage is or is not included.

But some analysts were skeptical of such threats.

“Ultimately, for most members, there is no single issue that’s worth risking the social legislation of a generation,” said Edward F. Howard, head of the Alliance for Health Reform, a nonpartisan educational group here. “I just don’t know how many members there are who will stake out a single issue and then go over the cliff for it.”

Health care lobbyist Bruce Fried, whose clients have included the Catholic Health Assn., which represents 1,200 Catholic health facilities, agreed.

“The inclusion or exclusion of abortion services will not ultimately determine whether there’s health care reform,” he said.

Some abortion-rights advocates privately conceded that they may have to accept something less than a blanket guarantee of coverage. A potential compromise might be a conscience clause allowing employers who oppose abortion to opt out of covering it, as well as a similar escape clause for medical providers--provisions that are already in some of the plans passed by various committees.

Although abortion coverage is now included in the vast majority of health insurance plans under the rubric of “pregnancy-related services,” Helen Alvare, the bishops conference planning director, argued that inclusion of abortion coverage in a universal benefits package would go far beyond existing practice.

“The status quo is this: Abortion is legal. Anyone is free to buy abortion coverage or to buy a policy that excludes it,” Alvare said. “But when you make abortion coverage a mandatory benefit, you dramatically depart from the status quo.”

Of the mobilization effort, Alvare said, 5 million church members have already sent cards to members of Congress urging the exclusion of abortion coverage. The conference now will urge the signers to remobilize and talk and write to their elected representatives.

The conference also has prepared radio and television ads that “we’ll use when we decide we need to,” Alvare said.

The bishops also released data from a survey commissioned by the conference, which found that while 70% of the public favors universal coverage, 65% oppose “taxpayer subsidized abortion coverage.”

In the survey by the Times Mirror Center, respondents were read a list of six services--basic hospital and physician coverage, long-term care, abortion, prescription costs, preventive services and psychological or psychiatric counseling--and asked which should be included in a basic health benefits package.

All the services got positive responses of 68% or more except abortion, which was favored by 26%. When doctors were read the same list, they said all the services should be included. They favored inclusion of abortion, however, by only a margin of 52% to 43%. All other services were favored by at least 69%.

* SECOND OPINION: A new poll finds doctors are opposing Clinton’s agenda. A10