Posted on: Friday, July 27, 2001

Editorial
New child health plan sets bad public policy

Health officials in Hawai'i and across the country have recently received a draft letter from the Bush administration that, while appearing to be good news, may actually be bad news for those who believe Washington is the wrong place to resolve issues of choice and abortion rights.

The letter says the administration is considering extending its popular Children's Health Insurance Program, known as CHIP, to pregnant women.

That's good news for states struggling to meet the health needs of the needy. But there is a ringer in this: It would be the unborn child, not the pregnant woman, who would be eligible for benefits.

That's a substantial difference from Medicaid, which CHIP was designed to support. Under Medicaid, pregnant women who qualify are already covered for prenatal services. It would be simple enough to extend the same rules to the CHIP program.

So why aim benefits at the fetus rather than the mother? One thought is that this is an effort to create federal health "rights" for fetuses. That's the wrong way to create public policy, and could end up sacrificing the health interests of mothers and their babies.