On March 30, 2023, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas vacated actions taken by HHS to implement provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that require health insurance plans to include coverage for...more
Donors State Claims for Misuse of Their Funds, But Not as a Class Action - In Carrier v. Ravi Zacharias Int'l Ministries, Inc. No. 1:21-CV-3161-TWT, 2022 WL 1540206 (N.D. Ga. May 13, 2022) and Carrier v. Ravi Zacharias...more
The US Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and Treasury (the Departments) recently issued a proposed rule (the proposed rule) to eliminate a moral exemption to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) contraceptive mandate...more
Wednesday, November 16, 2022: USDOL ALJ Approved Consent Decree in Long-Running OFCCP Action Against Convergys - In July, Secretary Walsh Intervened to Order Contractor’s Compliance with Document Demands - U.S. Department...more
On September 7, 2022, a US district court judge for the Northern District of Texas issued a ruling that preventive care provisions in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) requiring private insurance plans to cover drugs that prevent...more
On Aug. 4, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) published its proposed rule, Nondiscrimination in Health Care and Activities (Proposed Rule), to revise its regulations pertaining to Section 1557 of the...more
Introduction - Recent litigation has once again illustrated the ways in which religious beliefs and bioethics can collide under Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act, which prohibits discrimination in healthcare by entities...more
On July 8, 2020, the United States Supreme Court decided two cases addressing employers’ religious freedoms in very different contexts: one concerning whether religious school teachers could challenge adverse employment...more
On July 8, 2020, in the consolidated cases of Little Sisters of the Poor Saints Peter and Paul Home v. Pennsylvania et al. and Donald J. Trump, President of the United States, et al. v. Pennsylvania et al., the U.S. Supreme...more
On Wednesday, July 8, 2020, the Supreme Court weighed in on whether religious employers are required to offer their employees health plans that include contraceptive coverage. In its opinion in Little Sisters of the Poor v....more
The Supreme Court just upheld two Trump-era rules expanding religious and moral exemptions to the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) contraceptive mandate. The July 8 decision in Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania is just...more
In Little Sisters of the Poor Saints Peter and Paul Home v. Pennsylvania, the Supreme Court this week upheld regulations issued by the U.S. Departments of Treasury, Labor, and Health and Human Services (the Departments) that...more
On July 8, the U.S. Supreme Court issued two 7-2 decisions involving religious exemptions to federal employment and benefits laws....more
This week, the Supreme Court ruled that employers may exclude coverage for birth control from their health plans based upon moral or religious objections to contraception. ...more
Until this week, federal law required most insurance plans to cover the cost of birth control without a copay. However, the history behind this issue can be traced back much further....more
On July 8, 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Little Sisters of the Poor Saints Peter and Paul Home v. Pennsylvania and Trump v. Pennsylvania, holding that the Department of Health and Human Services validly created...more
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has released proposed regulations that, if finalized, will significantly narrow the scope of the nondiscrimination requirements under Section 1557 of the Affordable Care...more
Timely Topics - By Shannon B. Hartsfield - The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced on Jan. 18, 2018, the creation of a new division within its Office for Civil Rights (OCR). OCR is described as...more
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) just issued new rules which will limit the contraception coverage mandate covering employers under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The new rules, released Friday, expand the...more
Changes are imminent for the Affordable Care Act and a range of other laws and regulations affecting the health care industry. Ballard Spahr attorneys established a Health Care Reform Initiative in 2008 to monitor and analyze...more
As LGBTQ rights have taken center stage in political and social issues, FordHarrison has been following ground-breaking litigation related to LGBTQ rights and providing updates. In the latest decision, a federal judge in...more
Some employers may want to reconsider their approach to gender transition benefits after a federal court enjoined the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) from enforcing its 2016 nondiscrimination regulations...more
On Saturday, December 31, 2016, a federal judge in Texas entered a nationwide preliminary injunction barring the enforcement of antidiscrimination protections pertaining to transgender and abortion health services and...more
Timely Topics - The final rule implementing Section 1557 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) was issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office for Civil Rights (OCR) on May...more
In a recent Supreme Court case, Zubik v. Burwell, the justices vacated and remanded six federal appellate judgements on whether an accommodation (described below) for employers that object to providing contraceptive coverage...more