Gee, I wonder why this free birth control law went nowhere

[FakePigtails]

This is so messed up (full article at http://www.indystar.com/article/2011110 ... dyStar.com):

Six years ago, Indiana passed a law to provide free birth control to low-income mothers who had recently given birth. The idea had much going for it. Health-care professionals said it would lead to healthier babies. Legislative analysts said it would save the state and taxpayers close to $7 million over five years. It undoubtedly would have led to fewer unwanted pregnancies, fewer children born into families not financially able to take care of them and fewer abortions. And if all that weren't enough, the plan had already been tried -- successfully -- in about 20 other states. The legislature in 2005 voted nearly unanimously to approve the law, which was expected to serve more than 27,000 women per month by the fifth year. But six years later, not a single person has benefited. And none of those millions of dollars has been saved.

...

WHY? The short answer is that the state's Family and Social Services Administration never completed the process to apply for the federal Medicaid expansion program that would have provided the free birth control.

The legislation required Gov. Mitch Daniels' Office of Medicaid Policy and Planning -- an office within FSSA -- to apply to federal officials for the Medicaid expansion before Jan. 1, 2006.

It didn't.

The Medicaid office sent its application in a year late, and then -- over the ensuing five years -- withdrew it, resubmitted it, and then withdrew it again.

It's not entirely clear why.

...

After being questioned by Simpson and a few other lawmakers, she wrote them a letter explaining that "FSSA no longer has the resources to fund the implementation."

The state, in other words, could not pay the start-up costs -- originally estimated at $1.36 million -- for a program the state's own analysts had predicted would yield $8.1 million in savings within five years.

...

It does not always take so long for Daniels' Medicaid office to apply to amend its Medicaid plan. When a state law cutting off Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood went into effect May 10, the state submitted its application to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services -- within five days.

SMH. I'm just going to venture a guess that there was someone's religious beliefs led to them procrastinating this into failure.

[gustava]

Ebil sex! Stop that, ebil girls!

[Austin]

That's disgusting. No politics in play there at all, I'm sure :roll: