Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has called for a government watchdog to investigate why some health insurance plans charge women for contraception in violation of federal law that requires them to provide it for free.
In all 50 states, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) guarantees insurance coverage for women’s preventive services, including all Food and Drug Administration-approved methods of contraception.
but In a letter Insurers are still billing customers and, in some cases, denying applications for coverage, Sanders said in a report filed Monday with the Government Accountability Office.
“The ACA has been federal law for 14 years, yet health plans continue to deny coverage and ignore federal mandates,” Sanders wrote. “It is completely unacceptable that health plans routinely ignore mandated coverage with little enforcement or accountability.”
He cited a recent investigation in Vermont that found three health insurers in the state — Blue Cross Blue Shield Vermont, MVP Healthcare and Cigna Healthcare — improperly charged patients $1.5 million for contraceptives that should have been provided at no copayment.
Sanders further added: Survey in October 2022 An investigation by the House Oversight and Accountability Committee found that health plans and pharmacy benefit managers ignored ACA requirements by excluding or imposing cost-sharing on at least 34 types of contraceptive products.
Between 2015 and 2021, the majority of insurers surveyed denied an average of more than 40 percent of exception requests for contraceptive products, with one company denying more than 80 percent of requests each year, according to the committee’s report.
A 2023 staff follow-up report found that, contrary to the ACA, many patients covered by the five largest health insurers and the four largest pharmacy benefit managers face coverage exclusions and other restrictions on contraceptive products.
In January, the Biden administration proposed expanding coverage of contraception, including eliminating moral exemptions established under the Trump administration that made it easier for private health plans and insurers to exclude contraception from coverage.
The administration’s health agency has issued guidance to private insurers to cover a wider range of federally approved contraceptives at no cost under the Affordable Care Act.
Access to contraception has become a political battleground, with Democrats leaning into protecting contraception as part of their election-year push for reproductive rights, seeking to highlight Republican efforts to oppose protections they say many voters support.
