Jillian Rayfield August 2, 2011, 6:26 PM

Rep. Steve King (R-IA) thinks it’s “Orwellian” that the federal government would require health insurance providers to cover birth control, and that if left unchecked the policy could allow the U.S. to become “a dying civilization.”

On Monday the Obama Administration announced that insurers will soon be required to cover birth control, among other services, with no co-pays. All of the services were described by the Obama Administration as “preventive health services,” based on recommendations from the independent, nonprofit Institute of Medicine.

King objected to this policy on the House floor on Monday night, saying that it is simply government overreach and part of Obama’s plan for socialized medicine: “We have people that are single, we have people that are past reproductive age, we have priests that are celibate. All of them, paying insurance premiums that cover contraceptives so that somebody else doesn’t have to pay the full fare of that?”

King particularly took offense to the “preventative” part of the language: “And they’ve called it preventative medicine. Preventative medicine. Well if you applied that preventative medicine universally what you end up with is, you’ve prevented a generation. Preventing babies from being born is not medicine.”

“That’s not constructive to our culture and our civilization,” King said. “If we let our birth rate get down below the replacement rate we’re a dying civilization.”

He later added: “Now none of us would have health to care about if they prevented us, would they Mr. Speaker? That is just it is bizarre, it’s Orwellian.”

Watch:

h/t Political Correction, Media Matters.

Birth Control, Health Care, Steve King