CHA Livid Over Insurance Bill Veto, but Bill Endangers the Unborn

The State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) expired Sept 30, and President Bush vetoed a bill that would have renewed the program.
The Catholic Health Association is condemning Bush for failing to protect the 10 million children that it says are in need of coverage.
The president had threatened to reject the bill if it included large funding increases, and the senate bill included an additional 35 billion dollars.
The regulations for insurance coverage were also altered to subsidize contraception, sterilization, and create a potential for state funded abortion. While the recently expired SCHIP regs had a clause to cover unborn children, the new senate bill, if it had passed, would have allowed a redefinition of prenatal care to include abortion. Further changes in the program were to allow state abstinence program money to be reallocated into family planning programs - a reason that Planned Parenthood was backing the bill.

The battle rages on, as Democrats will vote to overturn the veto in 2 weeks and try to jam the highly modified program back at the GOP, and claim that the administration is against insuring children. The president has been working to renew the program, but with a lower fund increase. He has also outlined a broad private health insurance plan in here.

SCHIP is on a 16 week extension, so the 6.5 million children currently under coverage remain insured.
http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=53947
http://ncregister.com/site/article/4550
http://www.lifeethics.org/www.lifeethics.org/2007/10/schip-goes-on-in-spite-of-veto.html