The Globe & Mail, June 15, 1983, reported that an un-named Ontario doctor received $1,200 earlier this year from the Ontario Health Insurance Plan for 18 illegal abortions.

OHIP policy is to pay for abortions done in approved and accredited hospitals. The doctor in question submitted claims with a hospital number attached. When the mistake was discovered, he was refused subsequent claims. OHIP is recovering the money by deducting it from the doctor’s next monthly claim.

Spokesman for OHIP, Mr. Clive Shepherd, assistant to the general manager, denied that OHIP has ever knowingly paid for abortions performed outside an approved hospital. But he said the forms OHIP receives from doctors may use a different term for abortion and “it is within the realm of conceivability (sic) to describe an abortion in a different fashion.”

Mr. Shepherd said that the plan will not pay for abortions done in Morgentaler’s Toronto clinic. However, a clinic spokesman said that Ontario women have billed OHIP for abortions done by Morgentaler in Montreal and have encountered problems in getting reimbursed. She added that the Toronto clinic will try to bill OHIP for abortions performed there.