By KRWG News
Texas – Texas lawmakers have approved a massive health care bill that includes new restrictions on abortions. The measure now goes to the governor.
The 185-page bill allows for new health care collaboratives that allow hospitals, doctors and insurers to work together in new ways. It also allows Texas to enter into interstate health care compacts for Medicaid. But the most controversial matters concerned new restrictions on abortions that divided Republicans.
In signing contracts to provide family planning services, the bill bans the state from working with organizations that provide elective abortions, or affiliate with those that do. An attempt to defund Planned Parenthood. The bill also cuts state funding to county hospital districts that use local tax money to finance elective abortions. Travis County is the only district that does so.
Copyright 2011 The Associated Press.