The Questions No One is Asking about the Kermit Gosnell Case…

By Carol E.Tracy and Kate Michelman

With Kermit Gosnell’s criminal trial underway in Philadelphia, public outrage at the physician accused of murdering one woman and seven infants increases with each grisly new piece of evidence.

But the Gosnell trial raises several inescapable questions:  How could this happen? In particular, how, in a state that has led the nation in imposing restrictions on abortion, could such atrocities go undetected?  Just as puzzling is why the numerous complaints against him were ignored.  The answer is simple:  throughout the 1970s and 1980s, when abortion policy was established, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s primary goal was to overturn Roe v. Wade and, barring that, impose as many barriers as possible to limit access to abortion.  By and large, our policymakers have never viewed abortion as a medical procedure – instead placing it under the Pennsylvania Crimes Code – and therefore have not nurtured a system of abortion care that is woman-focused, readily accessible, and responsive to their medical needs.  The Commonwealth’s focus has been on denying access, not protecting the health and safety of women who need this medical care. If the charges against Gosnell prove true, Gosnell was an outlaw who repeatedly violated numerous laws and should have been shut down years ago, but the state did not hold him accountable to its own laws and policies.

So why did women go to his clinic? Why not choose a legitimate, reputable provider of abortion care? During a Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee hearing on proposed abortion regulation bills, Tyhisha Hudson, a woman who had obtained an abortion at Gosnell’s clinic, was asked why she went to him.  She testified that women in her neighborhood knew that Gosnell was the man you saw for the cheapest abortion.

Another Gosnell patient, Davida Johnson, noted in an Associated Press article that she intended to go to Planned Parenthood for an abortion procedure, but was scared away by anti-abortion protesters picketing outside the clinic. An acquaintance suggested she go to Gosnell, where protesters (ironically) were not an issue.

Evidence suggests that a number of factors influenced a woman’s decision to seek care at Gosnell’s clinic: Medicaid’s refusal to provide insurance coverage for most abortions; the scarcity of abortion providers in Pennsylvania (and across the nation); the fear of violence perpetrated by protestors at clinics, and the right-wing culture that has so stigmatized abortion that many think it is still illegal 40 years after Roe v. Wade.

It is critically important that the women of Pennsylvania know that abortion is legal and is a safe medical procedure.  As set forth in the Gosnell Grand Jury Indictment, legitimate providers, like Planned Parenthood and members of the National Abortion Federation, follow the law and standard medical procedures.

Unfortunately, politicians in Congress and in Harrisburg continue to make it more and more burdensome for women to get safe abortions.  Since 1976, Congress has annually re-authorized the Hyde Amendment, which bans federal Medicaid coverage of abortion care except in cases of rape, incest, or if the pregnant woman’s life is endangered. Pennsylvania law likewise restricts any state Medicaid money from funding the procedure except in those three rare circumstances (rape, incest, and threat to the woman’s life), so low-income Pennsylvania women are as a rule responsible for covering the entire cost of an abortion out-of-pocket. This cost equals or exceeds an entire month of TANF assistance benefits for most families.

Bills currently pending before the Pennsylvania legislature would ban coverage of abortion in health insurance policies sold in the health care exchange under the Affordable Care Act. These extreme measures would ban abortion coverage even when the woman’s health is endangered if she is forced to continue a dangerous pregnancy, and even when the coverage would be separately paid for with the woman’s own money.

Reputable, careful providers of high quality abortion care are under attack. As a result of an orchestrated campaign of harassment, intimidation and violence against individual doctors and freestanding women’s clinics by domestic terrorist organizations like the Army of God and Operation Rescue, the number of abortion providers in the United States declined 38 percent between 1982 and 2005. In Pennsylvania, there is not a single freestanding abortion provider in the hundreds of miles between Pittsburgh and Harrisburg.

To compound the provider shortage problem, the Pennsylvania legislature passed a new law in 2011 modeled after a bill on the wish list of the National Right To Life Committee:  mandating that the remaining handful of abortion providers come into compliance with volumes of costly regulations designed for ambulatory surgical facilities where much more complex surgeries take place. Today, there are just 13 freestanding providers of surgical abortion care in Pennsylvania, down from 22 two years ago.

Pennsylvania is not alone in developing strategies to regulate abortion care right out of existence. In fact, state legislatures have enacted 135 abortion restrictions in the last two years, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

For readers who feel this doesn’t apply to them, mark our words, it does, because it is likely that you know someone who has had an abortion. One in three women will have an abortion by the time she is 45. Between 30 and 40 million women have had abortions since Roe v. Wade was decided in 1973.

History tells us that whether abortion is legal or illegal, women will have abortions – the only difference is whether women live or die.  As in the pre-Roe days, women with resources can usually find quality care; but those without resources will often seek out the cheapest possible care. The long-term impact of burdening and stigmatizing abortion care could be that the most vulnerable women will once again have to risk their health and lives to get what should be a completely safe and common medical procedure.

Kate Michelman is co-chair of WomenVote PA, an initiative of the Women’s Law Project, and President Emeritus of NARAL Pro-Choice America.

Carol Tracy is co-chair of WomenVote PA, an initiative of the Women’s Law Project, and Executive Director of the Women’s Law Project.

Roe v. Wade 40 Years Later: How Far Have We Come?*

By Kate Michelman and Carol Tracy

January 22nd marks the fortieth anniversary of landmark Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade.

Roe v. Wade was a historic milestone for women in America, because this right to control our capacity to reproduce – including our right to use contraception – significantly enhances our ability to participate fully in society. It helps ensure our personal privacy, our dignity, and our health.

Roe v. Wade promised to protect our ability to make decisions about our bodies without unwarranted interference, and recognized the essential importance of equality and freedom for women in our society.

On this fortieth anniversary, it is appropriate to ask if the promise of Roe v. Wade has been fulfilled.  Has women’s liberty and equality progressed as far as we hoped it would since January 22, 1973?

Clearly there have been some great strides forward. During the 2012 elections, women turned out in droves to make their voices heard. In almost every instance where women’s reproductive rights were challenged, freedom of choice prevailed. Earlier this month, a record number of women were sworn into the 113th Congress. Indeed, some may view the successes of 2012 as a sign of continually emerging equality and solid and lasting protection against discrimination and political harassment. Sadly, they would be wrong.

In 2012, forty-two states and the District of Columbia enacted 122 reproductive health-related measures. The primary purpose of at least 43 of those was to limit access to abortion.  This was in addition to the 92 abortion restrictions enacted in 2011. Twenty states restricted abortion coverage through the state health insurance exchanges mandated by the Affordable Health Care Act. Crucial family planning funds were slashed from many state budgets.  Funding for reproductive health services in non-state operated clinics such as Planned Parenthood came under attack at both the state and federal levels. Currently, contraception can be barred from employer-based insurance coverage in eight states, and abstinence-only education remains the norm in the majority of our country.

This fight against contraception reveals the true hypocrisy of the anti-abortion groups: their concern isn’t protecting the unborn fetus; it’s about controlling which choices women are, and are not, allowed to make.

Forty years later, women still do not have equal pay in the workplace and are discriminated against due to pregnancy and familial responsibilities.

And despite the record-breaking number of women in Congress this year, and despite women voting at higher rates than men, women remain vastly underrepresented in the political landscape, let alone the corporate world. Those who do beat the tremendous odds are subjected to double standards of behavior, gender-based rhetoric, and vicious vitriol directed at times towards their femininity rather than their capability.

Negative attitudes towards women do not end there. The continued occurrences and reactions to instances of rape and sexual assault are indicative of the negative attitudes towards women that permeate society today. The gang rape on a bus in India sparked a global furor. The rape in Steubenville, Ohio, our own backyard, sparked a similar wave of repudiation. However, the blaming, shaming, and judgment directed toward the victims of these horrific crimes remains a key component of the dialogue surrounding even these high-profile instances of sexual assault. While the sheer volume of sexual assault and rape speaks to the prevalence of violent and negative attitudes towards women, the victim-blaming and judgment that occurs paints an even more disturbing picture revealing how subversive and long-lasting these negative perspectives of women are.

Technically, the core protections guaranteed by Roe v. Wade remain intact. However, those protections are eroding due to the constant onslaught by radical conservatives bent on undermining the rights of women. The goal of Roe v. Wade was to ensure a woman’s right to control the most intimate aspect of her life. Without this right, simply put, women are unable to participate equally with men in the social, political and economic life of the nation.

The road ahead remains difficult. Our health, financial security, and personal safety are constantly challenged, compromised, and limited. So while we reflect on these past forty years, let us acknowledge and celebrate the extraordinary steps we have taken to move our country towards equality.

But let us also understand that hard work and vigilance is needed now, more than ever, in the fight for women’s equality and justice.  The goal of Roe v. Wade has not been achieved, but on this anniversary it is essential that it also not be forgotten.

Kate Michelman is president emerita of NARAL Pro-Choice America, author of “With Liberty and Justice for All: A Life Spent Protecting the Right to Choose,” and co-chair of WomenVote PA.

Carol E. Tracy is Executive Director of the Women’s Law Project and co-chair of WomenVote PA, an initiative of the Women’s Law Project.

*NOTE: This post so far has appeared in the following newspapers and/or online: the Huffington Post, the Main Line News, the Harrisburg Patriot-News, and USA Today.

Women’s rights fight has moved to state level

Op-Ed  by Kate Michelman and Carol Tracy, appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Sunday, December 9, 2012

That Mitt Romney was stunned by his defeat says much about his and others’ blindness to the divergent forces that carried Barack Obama to victory.

Imagine the bitter truths they must confront as the nature of the electorate becomes clear. The demographic realities that shaped the victory gave joy to those of us who have been ignored, belittled, and targeted by the conservative right. The very women, youth, people of color, gays and lesbians they assumed to be at the margins of national politics had their revenge. And, yes, we voted for “liberal” causes, obvious rights that have been denied for too long by the people who saw the country through out- of- date lenses.

Women, in particular, claimed our rights in bold print. More women turned out to vote than men. We were the largest deciding block in Obama’s victory (11 points over Romney). We left absolutely no doubt that we demand and deserve equal rights: equal pay, an end to pregnancy discrimination and sexual harassment, better family health care, paid leave, and broad access to contraception. At t he t op of t he list: Government should have no part in a woman’s reproductive decisions. Choice. It’s what most women demand for all women. An exit poll revealed that Americans believe abortion should be legal, 59 percent to 36 percent.

We had a great day. We won a solid and lasting protection against discrimination and political harassment. The national vote said it all.

Wrong.

The national vote, while worthy of high-fives all round, is hardly the end of our struggle for women’s rights. When conservatives lose a decisive battle at the federal level, they redouble their efforts at the state and local levels. And they’ve already made that clear in Ohio. A few days after the election the legislature defunded Planned Parenthood.

Facing vetoes from the White House and having no hope of stacking the Supreme Court, pro-life advocates will become much more aggressive at the state levels. Their targets: governors (30 Republicans), Republican-controlled legislatures, and local governments and institutions, including hospital boards, PTAs, even library boards. They are particularly focused on judicial appointments.

Women showed our force in checking the war on women. But don’t be deceived; the war goes on. Only the battlefields change.

Consider some of their recent legislative gains across the nation. Parental disclosure. Ultrasound tests. Showing a woman the X-rays of her unborn. Preprocedure lectures. Shutting down clinics by needlessly raising architectural standards. Forcing women farther afield to find a clinic. The list goes on.

Extreme conservatives can’t roll back Roe v. Wade, but they can and will try to crawl beneath the radar of broad publicity with seemingly innocuous ways to shame us, to deny our rights and our equality. They will count on our satisfaction in winning the White House to soon give way to apathy. To ignore their zeal is to risk forfeiting our hard-fought gains.

To exercise their power in ways that affect their lives and health, women must educate themselves about the values and policy views of decision-makers at every level. In many cases, the decisions that have the biggest impact are made by officials who often don’t attract much attention.

The country is served well by national organizations, but today the greater need is at the state and local levels — to make effective use of traditional and social media and grassroots efforts to profile candidates and encourage women to be aware, to choose, and to vote.

The best of these information groups include both Republicans and Democrats. They may or may not endorse candidates. Their objective is to keep vigilance over all manner of issues affecting women in that state, to share solid information, and to demand accountability from those who threaten our rights.

The only way women will continue our advance toward equality and privacy is to be aware — to take the time not just to understand the forces trying to take back our recent gains, but to make the time to fight back.

Kate Michelman is co-chair of WomenVote PA, president emerita of NARAL Pro-Choice America, and author of “With Liberty and Justice for All: A Life Spent Protecting the Right to Choose.”

Carol E. Tracy is co-chair of WomenVote PA, an initiative of the Women’s Law Project, and Executive Director of the Women’s Law Project.

 

Abington Memorial Hospital and Holy Redeemer: Putting Women’s Health at Risk by Imposing Religious Doctrine on Patients

Amal Bass, WLP Staff Attorney

UPDATE: On Wednesday, July 18, 2012, Abington Health and Holy Redeemer Health Systems announced that they have abandoned their plan to merge.

In late June 2012, Lawrence Merlis, president and CEO of Abington Health System, and Michael Laign, president and CEO of Holy Redeemer Health System announced a joint venture between the two suburban Philadelphia systems with the goal of creating a regional health system by the spring of 2013.  The result will be a partnership between a secular hospital system and a Catholic system, a partnership that will dilute the quality of care women across the region have come to expect from Abington Health’s facilities.  In particular, the partnership will force Abington to stop providing comprehensive reproductive healthcare for women, thereby putting women’s lives at risk.

In 2011, Abington performed 64 abortions, primarily for women with high risk pregnancies that compromised their health.  For women with such high risk pregnancies, abortion can be a life-saving procedure.  For other women, abortion terminates non-viable pregnancies, possibly due to fetal abnormalities or placental problems.  For all women, regardless of the reasons behind needing the procedure, it is a fundamental right protected by the United States Constitution, and it should be a choice that is available at a hospital they trust.

Women who receive their gynecologic and obstetric care from Abington Health, which is one of the largest maternity care providers in the Commonwealth, will have to find abortion services elsewhere.  Hospital officials have not commented on whether Abington will continue to perform selective reduction, a process after infertility treatments where the number of embryos is reduced to increase the woman’s chances of carrying a pregnancy to term, which is typically banned at Catholic hospitals. The hospital claims that it will continue to perform contraceptive services and counseling, such as tubal ligations and vasectomies, which are typically prohibited by Catholic doctrine, but it is unknown if the services could be withdrawn at any time.  

Thus, the full impact of the imposition of Catholic doctrine on Abington’s medical services, if the joint venture goes through, remains to be seen.  Catholic health systems are slowly monopolizing health care across the country.  As of 2011, approximately one-fifth of all hospital admissions in the United States and between 10 and 20 percent of admissions in Pennsylvania are to Catholic hospitals.  These systems impose their religious beliefs, contained in the “Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services,” on patients of all backgrounds and faiths, interfering with the medical practitioner-patient relationship.  In 2010, the Catholic Church made its position on women’s health very clear when it excommunicated a nun serving as a hospital administrator for permitting doctors to perform an abortion to save the pregnant women’s life.

The result of this policy in practice could be that women in need of abortion, possibly needed to save their lives, may have a delay in treatment or may require a transfer while they are unstable to a non-Catholic hospital.  Abington may thus become vulnerable to medical malpractice lawsuits and claims for violations of the Federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) for putting religious doctrine before women’s health.  The imposition of Catholic Directives on patient care may cause experienced staff to leave the hospital, and it may also cause patients in the area to seek maternity and other care elsewhere.

Opposition to Abington’s partnership with Holy Redeemer is growing.  Rabbis from congregations in the area have written a letter to Abington’s Lawrence Merlis, protesting the planned joint venture.  A Facebook group, Stop the Abington Hospital Merger, has also formed.

To learn more about the dangers of receiving reproductive health care at Catholic-affiliated hospitals, see the prior posts on this blog, “Patients Are Denied Health Care on Ideological Grounds” and “Nun Excommunicated from Catholic Church for Saving Woman’s Life” and WLP’s 2012 report, Through the Lens of Equality: Eliminating Sex Bias to Improve the Health of Pennsylvania’s Women.

House Passes DHS Spending Bill with Anti-Choice Rider

Elizabeth Wingfield, Former WLP Intern

On June 7, the House passed a Homeland Security spending bill which included a provision that would prohibit Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from providing abortions to undocumented women who are detained. The measure was proposed by Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala) and allows for exceptions in cases of rape, incest, or endangerment of the life of the woman. While “the provision is unlikely” to pass in the Senate and become law, Rep. David Price (D-NC), spoke out against the rider, stating that “These abortion riders, while unnecessary, are inflammatory. They’re divisive.”

Barbara Gonzalez, a spokeswoman for the ICE, said that the agency has not paid for abortion services since its creation.  However, the anti-choice rider would prohibit women from accessing abortion even though ICE has never paid for one. Planned Parenthood released a statement after the bill passed arguing that

Not only is this amendment unnecessary and redundant to existing policy, but it is a clear case of bringing election-year politics into a critical discussion about U.S. homeland security issues. This unnecessary amendment disallows access to the full legal range of reproductive health care for women, including access to abortion services.

The Senate has yet to begin debate on the spending bill and its anti-choice rider but it may do so later this summer.

Pennsylvania House Introduces Bill to Defund Planned Parenthood

Nikki Ditto and Molly Duerig, WLP Interns

A bill recently introduced in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, HB 2405, aims to bar state and federal funds from going to health care clinics that provide abortions. Titled the “Whole Women’s Health Funding Priorities Act,” the bill would defund Planned Parenthood in the state of Pennsylvania, and keep women from receiving affordable reproductive and preventive health care. The bill was introduced by Representative Daryl Metcalfe [R- Butler County], and has the support of a number of republican representatives.

   View Rep. Metcalfe’s Press Conference

According to an editorial in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Rep. Metcalfe claims that “overall public funding for women’s health services would not be reduced, but that the bill would prioritize funding so that hospitals, health centers, and other clinics would receive money first.” Metcalfe’s goal is to defund any clinics or organizations that provide abortions; however, state and federal funds are already prohibited from being used to fund abortion services. This bill would instead impact the preventive care that Planned Parenthood provides for uninsured women throughout the state.

Abortions make up only “5 percent of Planned Parenthood’s services” in Pennsylvania.  The main role of Planned Parenthood is in providing “preventive care such as screening for cancer and sexually transmitted diseases along with providing birth control and prenatal testing.”  These services are essential for Pennsylvania women without health care and those without access to other health care providers. Last year, only “13,000 abortions [were] performed at eight of the 42 Planned Parenthood clinics,” as compared to the over 200,000 STD tests, almost 100,000 birth control prescriptions, and nearly 50,000 cancer screenings.  As a recent editorial in the Harrisburg Patriot explains,

If Metcalfe’s aim is to stop abortions, his approach is counterproductive. In many cases, women are getting from Planned Parenthood the reproductive education and birth control they need so they don’t end up with an unintended pregnancy that could lead to an abortion.

HB 2405 is just one of many bills introduced this session that aim to reduce or eradicate access to abortions in Pennsylvania. It is part of a growing trend of attacking both the clinics that provide abortions and the women who seek affordable and safe reproductive health care. The Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and the Harrisburg Patriot all released editorials condemning the bill and urging representatives of both political parties to vote no.  Currently, HB 2405 is stalled in the House, though it and other bills with similar consequences could come up for a vote later in the year.

Ongoing study: Mandatory ultrasounds have very little impact on abortion decisions

Mandatory ultrasound viewing is quickly becoming the new favorite tactic of the state-level war on choice. Six states currently require all women seeking abortions to view ultrasound images, and until women’s health advocates weighed in with a tidal wave of opposition, our very own state of Pennsylvania was poised to be the seventh.

The rationale behind mandatory ultrasound laws is that when a pregnant woman sees the ultrasound image of her fetus, she will feel a maternal attachment and be less inclined to terminate her pregnancy.

We’ve been hearing this argument for years.  According to the Family Research Council (an ultra-conservative group that actively opposes abortion, divorce, LGBT rights, and embryonic stem-cell research to name a few), “eight in ten pregnancy resource centers report that ‘abortion-minded’ women decide to keep their babies after seeing ultrasound images,” and “[a]ccording to an executive director of an Iowa pregnancy resource center, 90 percent of women who see their baby by ultrasound choose life.” Americans United for Life insists that “medical evidence indicates that women feel bonded to their children after seeing them on the ultrasound screen” – as evidence, they refer to a 1983 study that reported exactly two cases of women, around three months pregnant, feeling bonded with their fetuses after viewing ultrasounds.

Now, almost thirty years later, assistant medical professor Tracy Weitz is conducting a more comprehensive study – interviewing twenty abortion-seeking women in two states and surveying ultrasound clinicians about their practices – to determine whether ultrasound advocates’ claims are accurate. And while research is far from over, preliminary results suggest that women consistently choosing to carry their pregnancies to term after viewing the ultrasound image is less documented phenomenon, and more pro-life fantasy.

The majority of clinicians interviewed felt that ultrasound viewing typically had little or no impact on a woman’s decision. Some reported that the information gathered through the ultrasound was useful to women making their decisions – information such as gestational age – but the ultrasound itself was rarely a game-changer.  Said one:

 I’ve never had a patient change their mind simply by seeing the ultrasound… just seeing the ultrasound hasn’t made anyone say, “Okay well, I don’t want to do this.”

Weitz recommends giving all women seeking abortions the option of viewing an ultrasound image of the fetus, but discourages mandatory viewing laws and warns against expecting the images to change women’s minds. After all, as her study points out, 60% of abortion patients already have at least one child – and therefore, almost definitely have seen ultrasound images before – and most women who terminate their pregnancies do so because of the “material conditions of their lives.”

According to the same study,

The research has surfaced a few case studies in which women went to crisis pregnancy centers and were allegedly given false information about their gestational status. In some instances, women underwent ultrasounds and were told they were further along than they actually were, and were thus ineligible for abortions.

Mandatory ultrasound laws often have the effect of driving women to centers like this, which are some of the easiest places for women to get ultrasounds, but are agenda-driven and often not staffed with trained medical personnel.

This study seems poised to substantially debunk the maternal attachment myth behind ultrasound laws. When the results become widespread public knowledge, perhaps we can start to focus on the real reasons behind these laws. In the states where they are enforced, mandatory ultrasound viewing laws are a delay tactic aimed at preventing abortions by forcing women who want them to jump through time-consuming, expensive hoops so that by the time they have completed all of the legal requirements, they are too far along in their pregnancies to abort.

Weitz’s research confirms what pro-choice advocates have been saying all along: mandatory ultrasound laws are not based in scientific fact. They are not passed with women’s best interests at heart.  And a bill has been introduced in Pennsylvania.  Learn more about the threat by visiting the Legislative Action page on WLP’s web site and by following Pennsylvanians for Choice and We’ve Had Enough PA .  Take action here with petitions, signs, and other tools to make your voice heard. And Pennsylvania residents, remember to contact your representative in the house to express your opposition to HB 1077, Pennsylvania’s ultrasound bill.

Thank You to our male friends, colleagues, brothers, fathers, and partners for Speaking Up!

Everyone expects to hear women speak up about reproductive health issues–specifically about protecting a woman’s right to control her own body – because women bear the burden  - pun intended –  if no one speaks up.  Women and women’s organizations have been vocal, visible and active in Pennsylvania, outraged by the ridiculous and indefensible HB 1077 that would require women to have an ultrasound 24 hours before having an abortion.   What we did not expect was the gentle, rational, articulate voice of a man from Franklin County, PA, who wrote to his local paper about this bill, chiding the legislators to be honest about their intent:

Pennsylvania HB 1077 is a good example of how controversial legislation can debase the entire system.  I consider myself pro-life. In my idea of a perfect world, abortion and capital punishment are used rarely and nobody dies because he can’t afford the medical treatment needed to keep him alive. If I personally knew someone considering abortion, I would try my damnedest to get her to consider other options.

I also consider myself pro-choice, by which I mean I would not try to keep a woman from having an abortion by calling the cops and having the government force her to have the baby. I have a whole long list of places where the government does not belong, and a womb is on it.

No government in history has ever stopped abortion. The prohibition of abortion works exactly as well as the prohibition of alcohol. Women with money have always had access to clean, safe abortions, and they always will. When we talk about criminalizing abortion, we’re talking about sending poor women to back-alley abortionists and desperate young women to whatever horrifying choices they can make. And sending police after them….

In politics, people get so convinced that what they want to do is righteous, and so frustrated that they can’t get it done, that they will tell any kind of lie and cut any corner to achieve their goal. That includes designing bills that try to dress up their intent in a big pile of fertilizer.

HB 1077 announces its fertilizer tendencies with its name. It’s called the Woman’s Right-To-Know Act, as if there are women out there who have been demanding more information from their abortion doctors but just can’t get answers.

The bill requires women to get an ultrasound at least 24 hours before an abortion. The ultrasound provider must make sure that the screen display faces the woman. Thankfully, it does not require anyone to grab her head and force her to watch. She must get copies of the ultrasound and deliver them to the abortion provider. The doctor must offer her the chance to watch an ultrasound of a similarly-aged fetus. No other medical procedure in this country has similar requirements.

A heartfelt thank you to this man, a teacher, who took the time to write such a thoughtful letter.  The public needs to hear from men as well as women on this issue.  Encourage your brothers, fathers, friends, husbands, partners, and colleagues to speak up and speak out in support of your rights!

Lastly, it was reported today that HB 1077 has been temporarily shelved, but please don’t be fooled by this tactic. In all likelihood the bill will find new life after the Pennsylvania election. So please call your representative in the Pennsylvania House (and have the men in your life call theirs) to oppose HB 1077. This legislation is deceptive, demeaning and offensive.

Other stories on HB 1077:

Pennsylvania House GOP leaders delay bill forcing women seeking abortions to undergo ultrasounds (Patriot News)

PA abortion measure shelved (Tribune-Review)

Yes Virginia, there is a state more demeaning to women than you!

You’ve probably recently heard about the Virginia ultrasound bill, but did you realize Pennsylvania has a bill pending that’s even worse? The Pennsylvania House of Representatives is poised to take up HB1077, the disingenuously titled “Women’s Right to Know Act.”  Are you ready to stop the cruel, demeaning attacks on women in Pennsylvania? Sign the petition and urge your representative to vote NO on HB 1077 and stop this demeaning and unnecessary bill from becoming law in Pennsylvania.  Click here to find your PA Representative.

 Below is a Open Letter Reposted from We’ve Had Enough PA

Dear Virginia, (CC: outraged left wing media)

Your little legislature was wrong. There is a state more demeaning to women than you. Up here across the Mason Dixon line, we’ve managed to come up with a forced ultrasound bill more cruel and medically unnecessary than yours! (It was tough, I’ll be honest.)

If our bill becomes law, women will have to wait at least 24 hours after their ultrasound before an abortion, no matter how far away they live from the provider. And here in Pennsylvania, 113 of the 203 elected state Representatives have signed on to our ultrasound bill. That’s more than your twelve by a long shot! 

Our bill FORCES the doctor to turn the ultrasound screen towards the woman’s face. Don’t worry – we avoided constitutional meddling by “allowing her” to look away. I heard you only give ‘the opportunity’ to view the ultrasound image. LAME! 

LOVE the “free ultrasound providers” bit!  We did that too, so now we can funnel women to those so-called “crisis pregnancy centers” where they can be fed state-funded, unregulated misinformation. We don’t even require that ultrasound providers have any training!

Oh and you’ll love the part about the printouts – listen to this. We’re going to make the woman take TWO printouts with her – one for her scrapbook, and the other one SHE has to bring to the doctor performing the abortion (if she hasn’t been shamed out of it at this point! LOL). 

And come on now, only civil penalties?  Our bill includes civil and criminal penalties for doctors and patients who dare defy our legislating of medicine. 

Nice try, Virginia. But you’ve got nothin’ on Pennsylvania!

Your partner in crime,

 Pennsylvania
Virtue, Liberty and Independence (Unless you’re a woman)

 

PA Legislature Passes Disastrous “TRAP” Law

On December 14, 2011, after a raging legislative fight over women’s abortion care that lasted most of the past year, the Pennsylvania General Assembly passed Senate Bill 732 and sent it to Governor Corbett for his signature or veto. SB 732 will require safe, accessible abortion providers to comply with the burdensome and costly regulations now reserved for ambulatory surgical facilities, even though abortion is much safer and simpler than surgeries commonly conducted in ambulatory surgical centers.

Known as “TRAP laws,” (“Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers”), similar measures have been enacted in several states and are a tactic recommended by the National Right to Life Committee for closing down women’s clinics. Every medical and public health organization in Pennsylvania that has weighed in on the matter, including the unquestioned medical authority, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, opposes SB 732.

If SB 732 is allowed to take effect, most or all of the 20 existing freestanding clinics in Pennsylvania may have to stop offering abortion care temporarily, while they hire architects and contractors to transform their small clinics into sophisticated medical facilities; or they may close permanently, if they determine that their costs of making the required upgrades are prohibitive (particularly in light of the unavailability of public funding for abortion care). Instead of attending to the 37,000 Pennsylvania women who rely on them for safe care each year, providers will have to install hospital-grade elevators, acquire parking spaces and covered entryways, install specialized HVAC systems, double or triple the size of their procedure rooms, and rip up their flooring and install new flooring, among many other unnecessary and costly physical plant specifications.

The Women’s Law Project is busily at work on a legal strategy. The Governor could avoid not only litigation but also the potential of grievous harm to women simply by vetoing this bill. Please call him today, and tell him to veto SB 732, for the sake of the one in three women who will need abortion care by age 45.

GOVERNOR CORBETT: 717-787-2500
Honorable Tom Corbett
Governor of Pennsylvania
225 Main Capitol Building
Harrisburg PA 17120
PLEASE DELIVER A MESSAGE TO GOVERNOR CORBETT:
RESPECT WOMEN’S HEALTH – VETO SB 732.