¡ EN CALIFORNIA LAS PAREJAS GAY NO EXISTEN !

Advocate.com /June 30, 2010/Dan Meyer

Same-sex couples in California are less than half as likely to have dependent health coverage than people in heterosexual marriages, according to a new study by the University of California, Los Angeles. The article, published in Health Affairs, covers only the state of California and concludes that gay male partners are 42% as likely to get employer-sponsored joint coverage as straight couples, while partnered lesbians have only 28% as much of a chance of getting coverage.

The article explains that employers may be refusing coverage to partners of their gay workers despite the 2005 California Insurance Equality Act, which says all companies that offer dependent coverage to married, heterosexual employees must make the same policies available to state-registered partners.

Data was collected from the California Health Interview Surveys conducted in 2001, 2003, and 2005. People who did not report their sexual orientation were not included, nor were those over the age of 65. The final sample contained about 64,000 women and 47,000 men.

"The exclusion of gay men and women from civil marriage and the failure of domestic partnership benefits to provide insurance parity contribute to unequal access to health coverage, with the probable result that more health spending is pushed onto these individuals and onto the public," the authors write.