Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio announced this week that it is being forced to end their student health insurance program because of the Obama administration’s rule mandating coverage for contraception, and because of the added costs of other provisions in the Affordable Care Act.
Fox News is reporting that the school has decided it cannot participate in a plan that “requires us to violate the consistent teachings of the Catholic Church on the sacredness of human life.”
They are also unwilling to assume another requirement of ObamaCare which requires maximum coverage to be increased to $100,000 for policyholders, a rule that would double a student’s basic $600 policy by the fall, and triple it by the following year. The school’s insurance provider said the increases were the result of the Affordable Care Act.
“This is putting people in a position where they are having to choose between their faith and their morality, and now an unjust cost,” said Mike Hernon, the school’s vice president of advancement. “These sorts of regulations from the government are forcing our hand in a way that’s really wrong.”
Hernon also told Fox News on Wednesday that the changes represented a “moral and economic injustice.”
“This is unconscionable,” he said.
Because the Affordable Care Act also states that full-time students not be required to carry health insurance, this means Steubenville students who are not on their parents’ policy will soon have no health insurance coverage.
“We encourage you to decide how you are going to provide for accidents or illnesses requiring visits to physicians, health clinics or the hospital emergency room while you are a student here,” the school said on its website.
The U.S. Bishops have planned a two week protest against the birth control mandate from June 21 to July 4. A ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court on the constitutionality of a key component of ObamaCare – the individual mandate – is also expected to be handed down at the end of June.
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