Hilary Swank settles lawsuit with major acting union over ‘shockingly antiquated’ ovarian cyst treatment options

Actor alleges she stopped receiving coverage for ovarian cysts in 2015

Hilary Swank arrives for a special screening of ‘The Hunt’ on 9 March 2020 in Hollywood (ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images)

Hilary Swank has settled a lawsuit over what she described as “shockingly antiquated” views concerning ovarian cyst treatment options.

The actor filed the lawsuit in September last year against the board of trustees for SAG-AFTRA Health Plan, the health insurance arm of the Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, a major labour union for the entertainment industry in the US.

In the lawsuit, Swank said she has suffered from malignant ovarian cysts for more than 11 years and received coverage for her treatment from 2009 to 2015, when “the Trustees reversed course and stopped allowing Swank’s claims for treatment of ovarian cysts.

“It also just so happened that around the same time as when the Trustees no longer agreed to allow Swank’s claims, Swank was undergoing procedures to preserve her ability to conceive in the future. Seizing upon Swank’s choice to keep her options open, the Trustees pointed to an exclusion in the Plan for ‘infertility treatment,’ relying on the notion that the only purpose of preserving the health of an ovary is to procreate,” the lawsuit adds.

The filing also claims that “the Trustees repeatedly said that there was no medically necessary reason to treat or monitor ovarian cysts other than for ‘infertility treatment’.

“This matter addresses the shockingly antiquated question of whether the sole purpose of a woman, and specifically her ovaries, is to procreate,” the lawsuit reads in part. “When faced with a claim for insurance benefits for the medically necessary treatment of ovarian cysts and endometriosis, the Trustees answered ‘yes,’ determining that there could be no possible reason to treat those conditions other than for the purpose of trying to conceive.”

The Wrap reported on Tuesday that the lawsuit has now been settled. The Independent has contacted SAG-AFTRA as well as Swank’s attorneys for comment.

The SAG-AFTRA Health Plan told USA Today in a statement in September 2020, when the lawsuit was first filed, that “the Health Plan Trustees care deeply about our participants’ health and well-being as well as their privacy and therefore we are unable to comment beyond the statements that have been made public in Ms Swank’s complaint”.