Senate Health Care Reform Bill Contains Controversial MOTHERS Act, Abortion Study

Over the weekend I finally got time to roll through the recently-passed Senate health care reform bill and, like its House cousin, it contains much of the language of the controversial MOTHERS Act. You can download the Senate bill here and start reading at page 595.

As I noted in October when the House Democrats rolled out their version of health care reform, let me just carefully point out that it confuses me that legislation that is supposed to gain uninsured Americans access to health care (out of their own pockets in many cases) contains an Act that is little more than a postpartum depression screening program and public health awareness raising nation-wide education campaign. That helps uninsured Americans gain access to health insurance how? It makes me wonder what Senate (and House) members pushed for its inclusion and on what basis. I know the Act has been knocking around Congress for much of the past decade and could never gain passage, so I guess this was the most efficacious manner for its backers to get it through.

The MOTHERS Act itself has been the object of much criticism--by women even and a psychiatrist--as a disease mongering gift to pharma companies. Feel free to draw your own conclusions. I've learned from bitter experience that it's probably not very wise for me to have an opinion about the Act itself.

The Senate bill also contains language supporting basic research of the causes of PPD, epidemiological studies of its frequency, "the development of improved screening and diagnostic techniques" and "clinical research for the development
and evaluation of new treatments."

One wonders what new treatments those might be--isn't Paxil in pregnant women working out just fine so far for mother and child? Is there some new drug on the horizon specifically tailored to PPD? Is there some new psychotherapy on the horizon? Or are they just going to hand out money so that some researchers can pretend that there might be when, in fact, we're probably stuck with the pills and therapies we already have? And all of this affects Americans access to affordable health care how?

Inserted into the language on PPD research and education, the bill contains language similar to the House bill (which I wrote about here) on researching the mental health outcomes of women who have abortions or otherwise resolve a pregnancy. To whit:

"It is the sense of Congress that the Director of the National Institute of Mental Health may conduct a nationally representative longitudinal study (during the period of fiscal years 2010 through 2019) of the relative mental health consequences for women of resolving a pregnancy (intended and unintended) in various ways, including carrying the pregnancy to term and parenting the child, carrying the pregnancy to term and placing the child for adoption, miscarriage, and having an abortion. This study may assess the incidence, timing, magnitude, and duration of the immediate and long-term mental health consequences (positive or negative) of these pregnancy outcomes.

As I wondered aloud in October, it's not clear to me how such a study would affect Americans access to health insurance, but perhaps I am a blockhead. I also wonder who pressed to have this provision stuck into the bill since it's not clear to me whether such a study would serve the interests of pro-lifers or pro-choicers.

If anyone knows, feel free to enlighten me.