Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Longer Looks: The Abortion Debate; Rejecting Gender Binaries; And The Origin Of 'Medicare For All'
Concurring in an abortion case in May, Justice Clarence Thomas penned a lengthy and lurid polemic, warning that abortion rights are a form of racist eugenics revivalism. The statute at issue, passed in Indiana and signed into law, in 2016, by Mike Pence, the governor at the time, prohibited providers from performing an abortion if they know that it is sought solely because of the fetus鈥檚 race, sex, or disability. (Jeannie Suk Gersen, 6/5)
Just in the last few years, nonbinary identity has been slowly seeping into societal consciousness. A nonbinary actor, Asia Kate Dillon, has starred since 2017 as a nonbinary character on the Showtime series 鈥淏illions.鈥 A raft of new nonbinary models are featured in fashion spreads, and a Coke ad, aired during the 2018 Super Bowl, paired an androgynous face with a pointed gender-neutral pronoun. 鈥淭here鈥檚 a Coke,鈥 the voice-over said, 鈥渇or he and she and her and me and them.鈥 Nonbinary as a category has even slipped into state laws. In 2016, an Oregon court granted a plaintiff the right to label themself nonbinary on their driver鈥檚 license, and by now, though the Trump administration proclaims that gender is a simple matter of biology, some dozen states, from New York to Utah, offer some form of Oregon鈥檚 flexibility. Yet the nation鈥檚 glimmers of tolerance don鈥檛 necessarily mean much 鈥 even in New York, let alone in rural North Carolina 鈥 when you鈥檙e living in opposition to our most basic way of seeing and sorting and comprehending one another. (Daniel Bergner, 6/4)
When Medicare was created in 1965, few Americans were talking about universal health care. Even fewer realized that the bureaucrats behind the program hoped that it would eventually become that. (Abigail Abrams, 5/30)
Abortion over the internet can be an effective, practical alternative for women in areas where clinics are scarce. (Adam Rogers, 6/5)