By:  Rosson, et al.                                    S.B. No. 182
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
                                        AN ACT
    1-1  relating to prohibiting discrimination by certain insurers in
    1-2  issuing health insurance policies to women with fibrocystic breast
    1-3  conditions; imposing penalties.
    1-4        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-5        SECTION 1.  Subchapter B, Chapter 21, Insurance Code, is
    1-6  amended by adding Article 21.21-6 to read as follows:
    1-7        Art. 21.21-6.  FIBROCYSTIC BREAST CONDITIONS.  (a)  In this
    1-8  article, "insurer" means an insurer who delivers or issues for
    1-9  delivery or renews any insurance in this state, including any group
   1-10  policy, contract, or certificate of health insurance or evidence of
   1-11  coverage delivered, issued for delivery, or renewed in this state.
   1-12  The term includes a group hospital service corporation under
   1-13  Chapter 20 of this code and a health maintenance organization under
   1-14  the Texas Health Maintenance Organization Act (Chapter 20A,
   1-15  Vernon's Texas Insurance Code).
   1-16        (b)  An insurer, solely or in part because an individual has
   1-17  been diagnosed with or has a history of a fibrocystic breast
   1-18  condition, may not:
   1-19              (1)  deny coverage to the individual;
   1-20              (2)  refuse to renew a policy of insurance covering the
   1-21  individual;
   1-22              (3)  cancel a policy of insurance covering the
   1-23  individual;
   1-24              (4)  limit the amount, extent, or kind of coverage
    2-1  available to the individual for any other breast condition; or
    2-2              (5)  charge the individual or a group to which the
    2-3  individual belongs a different rate for the same coverage.
    2-4        (c)  An insurer who violates this article commits an unfair
    2-5  and deceptive practice as defined by Article 21.21 of this code and
    2-6  is subject to the penalties imposed under that article.
    2-7        (d)  Nothing in this article requires insurers to pay for
    2-8  fibrocystic breast disease.
    2-9        SECTION 2.  Subsection (b), Section 14, Texas Health
   2-10  Maintenance Organization Act (Article 20A.14, Vernon's Texas
   2-11  Insurance Code), is amended to read as follows:
   2-12        (b)  Articles 21.21, 21.21A, 21.21-2, <and> 21.21-3, and
   2-13  21.21-6, Insurance Code, and Chapter 122, Acts of the 57th
   2-14  Legislature, Regular Session, 1961 (Article 21.21-1, Vernon's Texas
   2-15  Insurance Code), apply to health maintenance organizations that
   2-16  offer both basic and single health care coverages and to basic and
   2-17  single health care plans and the evidence of coverage under those
   2-18  plans, except to the extent that the commissioner determines that
   2-19  the nature of health maintenance organizations and health care
   2-20  plans and evidence of coverage renders any provision of those
   2-21  articles clearly inappropriate.
   2-22        SECTION 3.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1995, and
   2-23  applies only to an insurance policy or an evidence of coverage that
   2-24  is delivered, issued for delivery, or renewed on or after January
   2-25  1, 1996.  A policy or evidence of coverage that is delivered,
   2-26  issued for delivery, or renewed before January 1, 1996, is governed
   2-27  by the law as it existed immediately before the effective date of
    3-1  this Act, and that law is continued in effect for that purpose.
    3-2        SECTION 4.  The importance of this legislation and the
    3-3  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
    3-4  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
    3-5  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
    3-6  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.