Posted by:
Brother Of Jerry
(
)
Date: January 28, 2023 01:07PM
This comes as a major surprise to me. I guess it must be hard hiring low wage women who are willing to pay for their own contraceptives. Either that, or the Church has decided that the number of people they will lose by covering contraceptives is lower than the number they will lose by refusing to cover them.
Chalk one up for the grass-roots.
https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2023/01/28/last-lds-church-employees-get/From the article:
Starting in February, birth control will be covered under health insurance for employees of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a decision many are celebrating as both a grassroots victory and one that brings the financial policy more in line with the faith’s teachings on family planning.
After all, the Utah-based faith, while encouraging husbands and wives “who are able to bear children” to do so, nonetheless leaves birth control decisions up to couples.
Deseret Mutual Benefit Administrators — the company that insures church employees, including faculty and staff at all Brigham Young University campuses, and one of the Beehive State’s largest employers — announced the change in an email to customers Jan. 26.
Founded by the church in 1970, DMBA describes itself on its website as a “private, nonprofit trust” tasked with managing church employee benefits.
Coverage, its notice specified, will include oral contraceptives, contraceptive patches, vaginal rings, intrauterine devices (IUDs) and injectable contraceptives. Emergency contraception, such as morning-after pills, will remain uncovered.
Surgical sterilization, meanwhile, will stay uncovered except
in certain cases, among them being the mother is 40 or older and/ or has already had five pregnancies or live births.
As with most insurers, male condoms are not covered.
When asked why the change occurred now — after decades of clients lobbying for it — a DMBA spokesperson, attorney Scott Eastmond,
simply said that “DMBA regularly reviews medical benefits and coverages and periodically makes changes in response to a variety of factors.”
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The remainder of the article covers the grassroots lobbying for the change, that went on for years. LDS Inc is basically a male echo chamber, so the change took a long time.