If you are one of the 3 million Americans who bought health insurance on an Affordable Care Act state exchange, you may be surprised to open up the mail this summer and find two separate monthly bills. Under a new rule finalized by the Department of Health and Human Services in December, insurers are now required to issue a separate invoice for the amount of your premium that they attribute to abortion services. So you’ll get one bill for abortion services and another for the rest of your insurance coverage.

Here’s what you need to know about the new requirements:

What is the background? Why was the change made?

The first thing to know is that federal funding for abortion has been illegal since 1976, when Congress passed a measure now known as the Hyde Amendment after its sponsor, Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.). (Subsequent updates included exceptions for pregnancies that are a danger to the life of the woman.)

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