Women Demand Equal Benefits for Equal Premiums

Oct. 15, 2009— -- Although she was in perfect health, Peggy Robertson says she was

denied health care coverage by an insurance company in 2007 because, they said, she had had a previous cesarean section.

But to her surprise, the company denying her coverage -- the Indianapolis-based Golden Rule Insurance Company -- had broken no laws.

Robertson recalled the story today during a the Health, Education, Labor and Pension Committee hearing on Capitol Hill, highlighting the gap in health care costs and coverage between men and women in America.

She and her husband had searched for independent health insurance options after they saw the cost of their current policy increase each year. Robertson's husband is self-employed, so they were unable to get access to a group health insurance policy.

Robertson contacted Golden Rule in an effort to find out why the company rejected her application, and was told in a letter that if she had been sterilized after the C-section, was over 40 years old, or had given birth two years before applying for coverage, she might have qualified for coverage.

"In order to consider coverage without a rider, we require that certain requirements be met," the company told Robertson in a letter she read to the committee today. "One requirement is that some form of sterilization has occurred since the Caesarean section delivery."

Committee members were shocked by Robertson's story.

"That gave me goose bumps," Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., said about the notion of sterilization. "That phrase, that concept, I found that bone chilling. No one in the United States in order to get health insurance should ever, ever be coerced into getting sterilization."

Robertson, too, was shocked and had contacted the International Caesarean Awareness Network, only to learn that, with individual insurance coverage, insurance companies in many states are free to pick and choose the people they insure.

"When it comes to health insurance, women are discriminated against," Mikulski said. "We pay more – in higher premiums – and get less. Often we are denied care, whether it's because pregnancy is considered a pre-existing condition, or because we're not covered for preventive and wellness initiatives."