UNC backpedals on abortion coverage mandate

Funny what a little media exposure will do.  After the organization Students for Life blew the whistle on the North Carolina Board of Governors rule that ended up requiring uninsured college students to pay for the one plan that included abortion coverage, the state has decided to make that coverage optional after all:

The University of North Carolina will let students remove coverage for elective abortions from their university-sponsored health insurance after a national group complained about the coverage.

UNC system President Erskine Bowles on Thursday directed a student insurance company to contact students who have bought a policy this fall and give them the chance to opt out of that coverage.

It’s not clear, though, that the opt-out will actually mean a lower premium, or whether it means that the students waive the coverage individually while paying the same price.  If it’s the former, then Students for Life has won an important victory.  If it’s the latter, then the same problem remains, which is that North Carolina is using this requirement to force some students to subsidize the abortions of others.

Let’s also take a moment and note that the NCBoG hasn’t reversed their policy of requiring their students on 16 campuses to buy comprehensive insurance, though.  They could have looked out for the best interests of their students and either let them be responsible for their own decisions on health care and insurance — which would have been the best choice — or to at least give them a range of options that included cheaper catastrophic insurance while having them pay out of pocket for clinic visits.  At almost $800 per year, comprehensive insurance is hardly a bargain for the vast majority of North Carolina students, and looks more like an attempt to use the healthy students as a way to subsidize higher-risk groups in the NC college system.

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