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Verify: Is rape considered a pre-existing condition under new health care bill?

Several news organizations have reported that under the new health care bill, rape is considered a pre-existing condition.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks as Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price looks on during a Rose Garden event May 4, 2017 at the White House in Washington, DC. Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images

Several news organizations have reported that under the new health care bill, rape is considered a pre-existing condition.

It’s a pretty shocking claim, but is it true? Our Verify team of researchers took a closer look.

We found there is an amendment to the bill that will allow states to let insurance companies charge higher premiums to people with pre-existing conditions. We went line-for-line through the amendment, and pre-existing conditions are not listed anywhere in it.

We went to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services: a government organization that does list the conditions. While that list does not include rape or sexual assault, it does include several conditions that could result from an attack, like sexually transmitted diseases, PTSD, stress disorders and emotional disturbance.

While we can verify this bill does not define rape as a pre-existing condition, it does define several common side effects as such.

VERIFY: Sources

MacArthur Amendment

Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

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