Report Shows Women Have Disadvantage In Current Health Care System

By Mariko Lamb, Talk Radio News Service

Members of the Joint Economic Committee released a report Thursday that revealed 1.4 million women have lost their health insurance during the recession. More than 1 million of those lost were due to a spouse’s job loss.

“Clearly the system is broken when 1 million women lose their health insurance because their spouses lose their jobs,” said Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.)

“Under the status quo, women are more vulnerable to higher health care costs than men and when they lose their coverage the impact is felt heavily on their children and their families,” Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) said.

Sarah Wildman, a self-employed journalist and mother, testified about her experience with what she described as an “inappropriate health care plan”.

“I didn’t realize that my choice to start a family would put us into debt,” Wildman said, after receiving a $22,000 hospital bill from her health insurance company that initially claimed to cover maternity care. “When you buy insurance on your own, there’s no guarantee that what you pay for is what you get,” she said, calling her private sector health insurance “anti-middle class, anti-entrepreneurial, and anti-family.”

“It is so important that the voices of people like Mrs. Wildman not be drowned out,” Rep, Cummings said. “We can not allow the current system to continue to break America’s families, businesses, and economies, and we must not allow it to break American women,” he said, urging Congress to continue promoting health care reform legislation that ensures women access to quality health care without being charged higher premiums than men.