Nationwide, women have historically been charged more for the same health insurance as men, solely because of their gender, leaving women less able to purchase vital health care coverage. This practice, known as gender rating, became illegal for certain health care plans under recent federal law, but gaps still exist in Rhode Island law that allow the practice to continue. Legislation sought to close these gaps and ensure that gender rating would not occur in Rhode Island regardless of any changes to federal law. Although the Senate approved this legislation, as it has for the past several years, the House failed to act on the legislation before the end of the session.
In April, the ACLU also testified before the House Corporations committee in opposition to a conflicting bill, H 5988, that purported to address many of the issues in the other bill, but allows for the discrimination on the basis of gender to continue. That legislation was also not approved by both chambers in time, and died.
