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Hobby Lobby Invests in Contraceptive Manufacturers?

Does Hobby Lobby invest in contraceptive manufacturers?

by David Mikkelson, Published Aug. 13, 2014



In April 2014, Mother Jones magazine published an article

reporting that Hobby Lobby, a national chain of craft stores that has been fighting on religious grounds a provision of the Affordable Care Act (i.e., Obamacare) requiring businesses to provide insurance coverage to their employees for contraceptives, nonetheless has significant investments of their own in companies that produce contraceptives. (Hobby Lobby's stated objection is not to all forms of contraceptives, but rather to certain forms of contraceptives, such as morning-after pills and IUDs, which they consider to be abortifacients.)

According to Mother Jones, as of December 2012 Hobby Lobby's 401(k) employee retirement plan had $73 million invested in various mutual funds that included manufacturers of various forms of contraceptives:


Several of the mutual funds in Hobby Lobby's retirement plan have holdings in companies that manufacture the specific drugs and devices that the Green family, which owns Hobby Lobby, is fighting to keep out of Hobby Lobby's health care policies: the emergency contraceptive pills Plan B and Ella, and copper and hormonal intrauterine devices.

These companies include Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, which makes Plan B and ParaGard, a copper IUD, and Actavis, which makes a generic version of Plan B and distributes Ella. Other holdings in the mutual funds selected by Hobby Lobby include Pfizer, the maker of Cytotec and Prostin E2, which are used to induce abortions; Bayer, which manufactures the hormonal IUDs Skyla and Mirena; AstraZeneca, which has an Indian subsidiary that manufactures Prostodin, Cerviprime, and Partocin, three drugs commonly used in abortions; and Forest Laboratories, which makes Cervidil, a drug used to induce abortions.


By David Mikkelson

David Mikkelson founded the site now known as snopes.com back in 1994.


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