Should US health insurers fund spiritual healing? As members of both the Senate and the House of Representatives slug it out over issues like government-funded health insurance, clauses that could force health insurers to pay for religious and spiritual healing have slipped into at least two of the healthcare reform bills currently making their way through Congress.
One of the House bills, for example, states that insurers shall not “discriminate in approving or covering a healthcare service on the basis of its religious or spiritual content”, as long as that service is tax-deductible. There is similar language in one of the Senate healthcare bills.
Christian Scientists are the only religious group whose practitioner services are currently tax-deductible and they believe strongly in the healing power of prayer. These bills will have to be combined over the next few weeks before being signed into law, and it’s unclear whether the “religious or spiritual content” provisions will survive. But if they do, they could force health insurers to pay for prayers from Christian Science practitioners.
“It’s so important that anyone in this country, not just Christian Scientists, not be discriminated against because they use spiritual care or rely on it instead of conventional medical treatment,” said Phil Davis, who manages media and legislative affairs for Christian Scientists globally, speaking to the St Petersburg Times, a Florida newspaper.
I wonder how the Obama supporting atheists on this blog will react?
Since when do people pay for faith healing? I thought offerings to the church covered a minister’s services.
How about Easter Bunny Healing or Santa Claus healing or maybe even the Tooth Fairy healing?
Cheesus!
You’ll get far better service and results from a faith healer than you will from a doctor on Barack Hussein Obama’s welfare program, eh, excuse me: health care program.
“I wonder how the Obama supporting atheists on this blog will react?” – Atheists on paper. They typically support BS faith healing and other mambo-jumbo as long as it is coming from “non mainstream” “good” religions. Ex. Native American faith healing? – Yes ; Wikkan faith healing? – Yes… Scientology faith healing? Yes … Catholic Church Faith healing … No.
THIS is the time to implement the KILLING of this bill.
Inserting things OTHERS WOULD NEVER SIGN, on there own as an individual bill.
The LUDICROUS, STUPID, ILLEGAL, that NO ONE would ever pass.
WE really need a LINE VETO, or a SECTION veto..
it USED to be that the Marijuana BILL was attached to BILLS they wanted to kill.
NOW they just add CRAP..and if it PASSES, who gets the money?
This is a great loophole that lets money flow from liberals -> to the church, where it belongs. Kudos to whoever managed to sneak this in.
“Christian Scientists are the only religious group whose practitioner services are currently tax-deductible and they believe strongly in the healing power of prayer.”
Wait a sec – are the Christian Scientists charging money to pray for people? Is God charging money for miracle cures?
Okay, I know the TV evangelists always want you money, but as St. Bono said: “The God I believe in isn’t short of cash.”
If I want to go to a Faith healer now, that is my right.
This just further points out how the Democrat’s are trying to remove our rights.
Commentators say everyone should have a ‘right’ to health care. The thing is, everyone already has the right to health care. What they are proposing is giving FREE access to health care. Those with common sense know, you can’t get something for nothing. Or there is no free ride.
There is always a price. And the price for the democrats bill is freedom.
Hypnotic treatments and placebos use the exact same basis for therapy, if a patient ‘believes’ they will be cured the chances are much better that they will be. There is no satisfactory scientific explanation for this and yet it is nonetheless statistically true.
The power of prayer:
http://tinyurl.com/yzfhsds
As a born again believer I have to say that this is pure silliness and unChristian.
The Bible in the Gospel of Matthew 10:8 Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give.
If any of the amendments go through they likely will be challenged because they effectively promote one particular religious group.
Which, by the way, if they DO charge for their “services” anything more than their basic expenses then they shouldn’t be tax-deductible OR charities. I really truly hate the charlatans in our society.
But hey, because I’m an atheist you weirdos just ignore me and keep pretending your nonsense makes sense and kill your babies. More earth for me and my friends later.
…or this may just be a plot to funnel money to Barack Hussein Obama’s best buddy Jeremiah Wright.
This could be interesting if it passes. Religion institutions could create faith based clinics that charge for services with the health insurance companies having to pay for some or all of the services.
No more rationing of health care based on religion.
This is just too liberal. There needs to be rationing of health care to a certain extent otherwise insurance companies will go broke.
If you have incurable bone cancer that no doctor was able to diagnose, a faith healer is the only person who can help you.
If you have been cursed to never walk again and enjoyed lavish sympathy and attention but are finally bored to tears of the ruse, a faith healer is the only person who can cure you.
If you can’t speak and all you need is a good slap to the head and call yourself a baby, a faith healer is the only person who can help you.
If you are afflicted with a victim syndrome that will only allow you to feel happiness when you give away anything of value… to the point where you are now starving and homeless… and you’re so downtrodden and pathetic that even a heartless scumbag wouldn’t take anything from you…
…a faith healer is the only person who can help you.
So I say-a “Praise the lord-a. Jeesus thanks you for your holey shoes-a and moldy bread-a… and I’ll take that prosthetic hand as well-a…. and-a is that 3 pennies I see?
Now tell us-a, are you happy? (yes)
I say again-a, ARE YOU HAPPY? (YES!)
Then my work here is done.
I’d be willing to bet a very large chunk of cash that this provision does not, nor was it ever intended to, override other requirements in the health care bill that mandatorily covered procedures must be medically accepted, with clinically proven efficacy. Until faith healing can clear the hurdle of clinical trials and peer review by the medical establishment, it won’t be required to be covered. Of course, insurance companies are still welcome to include these coverages in their so-called Cadillac plans.
My best guess, without even researching this issue, is that this provision is merely intended to make sure that normally accepted medical procedures administered by qualified personnel will not be rejected on the basis of some peripheral religious connection by the provider. This would seem more relevant to mainstream churches like the Catholics or Presbyterians, who operate a number of hospitals where they rely on medical science and don’t want to be discriminated against because they happen to display a few religious symbols or have church affiliations.
Make no mistake, this provision won’t serve as an open invitation for faith healers and witch doctors with miracle cures to peddle their prayers, chants, or mantras. If you need your chakras adjusted, you’ll have to pay for that out of your own pocket, just as before.
Sing two hymns and call me in the morning 😉
I think the story is BS. The wording is in there because many hospitals are run by churches.
I would be very angry to hear my tax dollars are going to Voodoo healing, water sprinkling, dunking heads, slapping foreheads and other religion founded weird shit.
#18. How angry would you be to hear that? Angry enough to stop paying? Or do you intend to just complain …and open your wallet every time the government asks you for more?
#5 got it right. Many riders are attached to bills for the sole purpose of making the bill unacceptable. The backer of the rider never indents for the rider to make it in to law.
Every once in a while the bill passes anyhow. That is how we get some really stupid ass laws in this country.
The clause in question should not be a problem. Why should a government be able to discount a therapy on the basis religious or spiritual content. On the other hand, governments should be careful with taxpayers money and only pay for therapies for which there is verifiable evidence of efficacy.
Another reason the good ol USA is going down the tubes.
I wonder how the Obama supporting atheists on this blog will react? /// Well, under bi-partisan, give away your position before you start negotiations, throw the baby out with the unused water, Obama Care==the single payer system is supposed to reward OUTCOMES not INPUT.
Under such a scheme, an infinite amount of faith healing would require payments of death benefits only.
I am shocked!!!
Someone is actually reading the documents?
The clause from HR 3200:
“Neither the Commissioner nor any health insurance issuer offering health insurance coverage through the Health Insurance Exchange shall discriminate in approving or covering a health care service on the basis of its religious or spiritual content if expenditures for such a health care service are allowable as a deduction under section 213(d) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as in effect on January 1, 2009.”
From the above clause, this also affects all insurance companies, not just the government run system.
There doesn’t seem to be any tax payers money going to faith healers here either.
20…
RIGHT IN 1…
GOD im good.
idiots UNITE GOD for president.
Of COURSE!
That is all that is needed; a government sponsored faith-healing component in trade for Republican support. How dumb of us to not have seen it before!
We can have the Single Payer Option, just as long as it has a method for paying faith healers. One caveat: the faith-healers who get paid must prove the efficacy of their treatment. That’s all. Done deal!
I used to date a Christian Science woman. I listened to all she had to say and I didn’t criticize. I was however SHOCKED when I saw a bill she had from a “Faith Healer”. They do in fact pay for these people to pray for them and they act like it is paying for a doctor.
#31 So Pedro, which healing do you use at home when curing athletes foot?
Voodoo or the faster acting slap on the forehead with the bouncer catching you from behind?
Well, the W. Bush administration burned money on abstinence programs.