Americans who suffer from an eating disorder face enormous physical, emotional, and mental hurdles — and with spotty insurance coverage, they face the added burden of significant financial hurdles as they try to cope with their disease.

As Kaiser Health News reports, the complex, often wide-ranging nature of eating disorder treatments often leads insurers to skimp on benefits, and state and federal consumer protections do not go far enough in ensuring sufficient coverage for Americans with anorexia, bulimia, and other eating disorders:

According to the Eating Disorders Coalition, a lobbying and advocacy group based in Washington, D.C., 14 million people are affected with anorexia, bulimia and binge eating disorder. And for many of these patients, getting a full range of insurance coverage can be difficult. Mental health coverage is often less generous than coverage for physical ills. In addition, helping eating disorder patients is complicated because it involves medical care, mental health services and nutritional therapy, requiring a team of specialists – often a primary care doctor, a therapist, a psychiatrist and a dietician. Patients argue that insurers don’t adequately cover all those services.

The coalition tried unsuccessfully to get eating disorders included in the “essential health benefits” the health overhaul law requires insurers to provide beginning in 2014. “Exclusion of eating disorders is all too common on the part of insurers seeking to limit interventions deemed non-essential,” the group wrote to federal officials in a in a January letter. “Despite being biologically based mental illnesses with potentially severe physical health ramifications, including death, eating disorders are all too often found on lists of benefit exclusions.”

The group noted that a survey of more than 100 eating disorder specialists found that “96.7% believe their patients with anorexia nervosa are put in life threatening situations” because treatments often are cut short when coverage is denied.

In an age of advertising campaigns that are increasingly leading to unhealthy body image issues in young girls — 80 percent of 10-year-old girls say they have been on a diet — these lapses in adequate insurance coverage for eating disorders should not be taken lightly. And although some states provide comprehensive coverage for mental as well as physical health problems, most have stratified levels of care depending on predefined categories of “mental health problems” — a system that, by some estimates, leads to only one in ten eating disorder patients receiving treatment.

Obamacare mandates that any coverage plan offered under the health law’s new statewide insurance exchanges in 2014 must meet federal benchmarks across ten benefit categories, including essential expansions to prescription drug, maternity care, and mental health services. Unfortunately, eating disorders are a particularly complex medical issue, and Obamacare largely leaves the definition of a required “mental health service” to the discretion of the states and insurance companies.

Campaign ads on abortion, contraception, and Planned Parenthood have spiked in the last month, from abortion-related ads running in just 14 races in September to more than 1,500 mentions of abortion in 50 races in the last week, according to data from Kantar Media CMAG. Eleven new ads on abortion aired in House and governor races on Wednesday alone.

The chart from CMAG shows how much ads containing mentions of abortion, contraception, and Planned Parenthood have proliferated recently:

Independent groups are running a number of ads targeting abortion issues as well. A ThinkProgress analysis of CMAG data found that conservative groups — such as Women Speak Out, Susan B. Anthony’s List, CatholicVote.org, and Campaign for American Values — dropped at least $300,000 on anti-abortion ads between October 9 and October 15.

Susan B. Anthony List’s new super PAC Women Speak Out ran at least $129,000 worth of misleading ads since October 9 that feature an alleged “abortion survivor” and singles out health care reform. Other ads revive the criticism that the Affordable Care Act’s birth control provision violates Americans’ religious freedom, even though the law provides accommodations for religious organizations. The Hyde Amendment also significantly limits when federal funds can be used to pay for abortion services, and health care reform maintained the existing restrictions.

According to a recent USA Today/Gallup poll, abortion is the most salient election issue for almost 40 percent of women.

In 2011, Utah’s Republican-controlled House and Senate passed a bill that would have enshrined abstinence-only education across the state and banned any instruction of birth control, condoms, or LGBT issues in student health classes. Utah Gov. Gary Herbert (R) vetoed the measure to prevent it from taking effect — and now that sexual education courses are mandatory in schools, one Utah lawmaker is proposing additional legislation to expand sexual health resources to parents.

State Sen. Stuart Reid (R) is proposing a bill that would require Utah’s Office of Education to prepare and distribute materials on sexual health to parents, as well as provide seminars to give parents in-person training about talking to their kids about sexual education topics. Reid told the Deseret News that many parents “don’t feel entirely comfortable” talking about sexual topics with their kids and need resources to help them learn how. “There’s reluctance to do that and what’s happened is we’ve turned it over to educators to take that responsibility on what is the most intimate topic in the lives of our children,” Reid said.

Fortunately, Reid’s bill does not seek to roll back the sexual education standards that are currently in place for Utah’s public schools. Health classes will still be required to teach students about physiology and prevention methods for pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections, although parents can choose to opt their children out of the courses. But Reid says he believes sex education should take place in the home, not in the classroom, and his bill is a reflection of that fact. Opponents to his measure, on the other hand, think it’s unnecessary to train parents to effectively communicate about sexual health:

The bill is only in draft form, but still managed to elicit debate and skepticism from members of the Education Interim Committee on Wednesday. Rep. Jim Nielson, R-Bountiful, expressed concerns about drawing educational resources away from academic core subjects, like reading, writing and arithmetic. Rep. Johnny Anderson, R-Taylorsville, suggested there is already ample resources available online for parents wishing to have a dialogue about sex with their kids.

“There’s a tremendous amount of information for parents who want to broach this with their children,” Anderson said. “This seems to me to be a government solution for a problem that really isn’t ours to own.”

Anderson is correct in his assertion that there are some excellent online resources about sexual health, but he misses the mark when he suggests that sex ed is less critical to youths’ education than “core subjects” like reading and math. In fact, comprehensive sexual education is essential to equip young adults with the resources they need to prevent pregnancy and STIs, understand their own reproductive systems, and develop healthy relationship skills that are centered on consensual experiences. And parents certainly need additional training, since they may not be prepared to effectively teach their children everything they need to know on those topics, just as many parents are not prepared to teach a high school English or math course.

While Reid’s bill could help further educate parents about an important topic they need to talk about with their children, parents’ guidance is not a replacement for comprehensive sex ed in the classroom. Sexual health needs to be talked about at home, but it also shouldn’t be confined to the home. Fortunately for Utah teens, however, the legislation in their state could allow them to have both.

The Texas Health and Human Services department on Thursday adopted rules that will end federal funding to their Women’s Health Program, denying thousands of low-income women medical care.

The rules require Texas’s HHS to stop giving funding to any organization considered an “abortion affiliate” — a loose definition for groups that tell women where they can get an abortion, provide informational material about abortion, or otherwise are related to an abortion provider in any way. In adopting these rules, the Texas HHS has forfeited federal funding for the clinics that provide essential health services to low-income women in the state, since that money is dedicated with the caveat that the funds cannot be selectively applied. Although Texas lawmakers are employing a tactic primarily intended to cut off funds to Planned Parenthood, the decision is having far-reaching effects in the state.

Already, women’s health clinics in Texas are feeling the crunch of the new regulations. Clinics are being forced to provide less effective forms of birth control, increasing the chances that the low-income women who will rely on their care will get pregnant. And the funding cuts have forced at least fifty clinics that are unaffiliated with Planned Parenthood to close their doors.

But the problems are expected to get even worse. While 160,000 women in the state already are forgoing care because of the budget cuts, an additional 100 providers (PDF) are expected to lose funding because of the HHS decision, cutting off care to an even greater number of poor Texas women.

During the fourth and final debate between incumbent Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) and his Democratic challenger, Tammy Duckworth, the Republican Congressman openly admitted that he and his GOP colleagues want to “end Medicare as we know it.”

Walsh defended the Romney/Ryan plan to turn Medicare into a voucher program, which would provide retirees with a depreciating premium support credit to purchase private insurance or traditional Medicare. Duckworth pointed out that Obamacare reforms extend the solvency of the Medicare program by a decade — and reminded Walsh of his unabashed support for Paul Ryan’s budget, which guts the core Medicare entitlement. And Walsh admitted that Duckworth’s assessment of Ryan’s plan was right:

DUCKWORTH: [Congressman Walsh] voted three times for the Ryan budget which will end Medicare as we know it. That is not my comment — that is the Wall Street Journal that says it will end Medicare as we know it. He wants to put seniors the street with a voucher. And he wants to go even further than the Ryan budget. He wants to eliminate the prescription drug benefit. Do you think that’s going to save Medicare? You want seniors to pay more for Medicare? You want seniors to pay more for prescription drugs? That’s not a single senior has come up to me and said that.

EDDIE ARRUZA (MODERATOR): Quickly, Mr. Walsh, respond.

WALSH: Ms. Duckworth says end Medicare as we know it. What the Chicago Tribune and every other responsible person has said if we don’t end it as it is, it’s going end all by itself — we won’t preserve it for future generations. We have to do that.

Watch it:

Wary of public backlash and the overwhelming popularity Medicare enjoys, Republican candidates across the country — including the Romney/Ryan ticket — describe their proposal as a way to strengthen Medicare for future generations. Last night, Walsh publicly confirmed that it is actually a fundamental restructuring of the entitlement and a raw deal for seniors.

HENDERSON, Nevada — In an uncommon moment of candor, a Republican congressional nominee in Las Vegas conceded that people age 54 and below “will probably feel a little more pain” if his party’s budget were passed.

During a candidate’s forum outside Las Vegas on Monday, moderator Jon Ralston asked Chris Edwards, the GOP nominee in Nevada’s 1st congressional district, about what impact the Republican budget would have on those under 55. (Republicans have gone to great lengths to try to exempt those 55 and above from any changes to Medicare.) “Some people will probably feel a little more pain than others,” Edwards acknowledged. “That’s probably going to be unavoidable.”

But, he argued, “if it will straighten out this mess, once and for all, it’s worth doing.”

RALSTON: All you guys running for Congress, for the Senate, want to talk about, “oh, we’re not going to do anything to those 55 and older” because you either mean it or you’re scared of them. I don’t care which one it is. What about someone who’s 52, 53, 54. What about them? Aren’t they shafted in this whole deal?

EDWARDS: If you take a smart approach, I don’t think they have to be shafted. I think that they can be taken care of as well. [...] Let’s pick the good course that people can agree to and take it. Some people will probably feel a little more pain than others. That’s probably going to be unavoidable. Frankly, I’m probably going to be one of the people feeling more of the pain. But if it will straighten out this mess, once and for all, it’s worth doing.

Watch it:

If the Republican budget were implemented, it wouldn’t just be those under 55 who would feel pain. Even today’s seniors would be impacted by higher premiums, fewer choices of care providers, or both.

On Thursday, after his debate against Demcorat Tammy Duckworth, Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) told reporters that an abortion exception is never necessary to save a woman’s life, explaining, “with modern technology and science, you can’t find one instance” of a woman dying from childbirth. Walsh claimed pro-choice advocates simply used the prospect of maternal death “to make us look unreasonable.”

Walsh went on to assert that women whose health would be jeopardized if they carry their fetus to term are simply using the exception as a “tool” to get an abortion for “any reason.”

With modern technology and science, you can’t find one instance…There’s no such exception as life of the mother. And as far as health of the mother, same thing, with advances in science and technology, health of the mother has become a tool for abortions anytime under any reason.

Watch it:

In fact, pregnancy-related deaths have increased in the US, climbing to a rate of 15.1 deaths for every 100,00 live births. Walsh’s own colleague, Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA), spoke on the House floor in 2011 about getting an abortion because her life was in jeopardy.

By pretending these women don’t exist, Walsh joins the ranks of his other colleague, Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO), who ignited a firestorm over his opposition to a rape exception because “if it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”