An epidemic of myopia appears to be plaguing much of the media. One account after another concludes the Supreme Court’s decision in the Hobby Lobby case provides an exemption to some employers from the Affordable Care Act’s mandate to cover costs of contraception. It does no such thing.

It excludes only abortifacients. Surely the distinction between drugs that prevent conception and those that destroy a fertilized egg is not too fine to grasp.

In another underreported matter, the law Congress passed included no mandate to cover contraceptives of any sort. The Department of Health and Human Services tacked it on following passage. Even some prolife Democrats have said they would not have voted in favor had they known the mandate would be added. One fact is that our elected representatives did not vote on contraception at all; the administration’s bureaucrats slipped in the mandate ex post facto. Another is the court has not excluded contraception from coverage, even in the case of Hobby Lobby.

Ed Fowler

Durango