Abortion – Abortion Clinics, Abortion Pill, Abortion Information

Florida Republicans are pushing legislation that would “disregard young people’s moral agency and decision-making abilities while placing enormous burdens” on teens seeking abortion care, an advocate said.

Approved last week by the House Health Quality subcommittee, HB 1335 would require a physician—at the risk of a felony—to obtain written consent from a parent or legal guardian before performing an abortion on a minor.
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Kristen Erichsen was 15, pregnant, and “terrified” when she appeared in court for a judge to decide her future. Erichsen knew she couldn’t be a parent and was scared she would become homeless.

“My mom had really terrible health, had an issue with painkillers, and we had been evicted multiple times that year, so there was no way I could talk to her about this. I was also under the impression that if I did, I would be kicked out,” Erichsen, 26, told Rewire.News this week.

That was in 2007. Florida had a parental consent law in place for pregnant minors seeking abortions. Erichsen’s social worker told her she was lucky to get a sympathetic judge to provide a judicial bypass that day. Many others didn’t. But it still wasn’t easy accessing an abortion—from having to get someone to drive her to court 45 minutes away, securing $400 to pay for the abortion, and navigate a sea of anti-choice protesters outside the clinic, the process was agonizing.

In the past six years, Florida legislators have tried to pass more than 50 anti-choice laws. And Republican lawmakers this month have introduced an anti-choice bill that could add more restrictions for teenagers seeking abortion care.

Approved last week by the House Health Quality subcommittee, HB 1335 would require a physician—at the risk of a felony—to obtain written consent from a parent or legal guardian before performing an abortion on a minor. Exceptions include cases of medical emergency or if the minor obtains a court order bypassing the parental notification and consent requirements. The GOP measure is pending in the state house judiciary committee.

A similar bill introduced March 13 in the state senate, SB 1774 or the “Parental Consent for Abortion Act,” would prohibit a physician from performing an abortion on a minor without obtaining consent from at least one parent or guardian.

Organizations like the American Medical Association (AMA) and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) oppose mandatory parental involvement in abortion decision-making, as do groups supporting teens and adolescents.

Forced parental involvement laws “disregard young people’s moral agency and decision-making abilities while placing enormous burdens” on young people seeking abortion access, wrote Jessica Goldberg, manager of attorney and pro bono programs at If/When/How, a national network of law students and legal professionals working for reproductive justice.

More than 50 organizations and advocates, including the National Women’s Law Center, Emergency Medical Assistance, and Equality Florida, have co-signed a Planned Parenthood letter urging the Florida legislature not to pass these bills.

“There is nothing more important than keeping our young people healthy and safe, but as the medical community has made abundantly clear, this bill would do just the opposite,” said Laura Goodhue, executive director of the Florida Alliance of Planned Parenthood Affiliates. “Most young people seek the counsel of a trusted parent or guardian without the government interfering and mandating it. And you can be sure those who don’t [tell a parent or guardian] have very good reasons.”

While several states have parental involvement requirements for minors considering abortion care, only five other states have both parental involvement and consent requirements—Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Wyoming, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

“Parental consent requirements are just another way that abortion opponents try to limit access to services. Young people know how to make decisions about their own health care including abortion,” said Elizabeth Nash, senior state issues manager at Guttmacher. “Laws that require parent involvement only serve to deny and delay access, not improve family communication. The judicial bypass process is also well-documented as causing stress and trauma and is difficult to navigate. What young people do need is care that allows them to make the best decision for their lives and future and from individuals that they trust.”

In effect for more than five years, Oklahoma’s notification and consent laws require physicians to send notification letters to parents, telling them of the intent to abort, and for minors (unless emancipated or married) to get written consent via a state-mandated form, or waive that via a judicial bypass, Tamya Cox-Touré, regional director of public policy and organizing at Planned Parenthood Great Plains, told Rewire.News. These policies have created obstacles for minors and have significantly decreased the number of judicial bypasses granted in recent years, she said.

“We already had consent laws, but this notification really created an additional barrier,” she said. “It is already hard for minors to navigate a judicial bypass in Oklahoma—we don’t make it easy at all. Navigating the judicial system is hard for anyone but to ask a minor to do that is even worse.”

Providers encourage parental involvement but recognize there could be problems like parents being absent, she said.

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), that supports the protection of rights of adolescents to confidential care when considering abortion, stated in a 2017 article that “legislation mandating parental involvement does not achieve the intended benefit of promoting family communication, and it increases the risk of harm to the adolescent by delaying access to appropriate medical care.”

The organization cited studies indicating that most minors involve a parent in the decision, even when it is not required by law. In states that don’t have parent involvement laws, 34 percent to 91 percent of minors told their parents about their plan to have seek abortion care. A survey of 1,519 unmarried pregnant minors in states where parental involvement isn’t mandatory found that 61 percent told one or both parents about their decision to have an abortion.

Minors strongly opposed to informing parents often have good reasons to fear the outcome which could range from violence to rejection and homelessness, echoing Erichsen’s experience.

Now a fourth-year graduate student pursuing a PhD in sociology at Florida State University, she finds it “ridiculous and hypocritical” that “the party that is supposedly against government intrusion is trying to mandate the way parents should communicate with their children, and I think it’s very ignorant of the experience that women and teens face. People who have good relations with their parents would tell them, and if they aren’t, there’s probably a good reason.”

Since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion in 1973, anti-choice groups have aimed laws at both the state and federal levels to restrict access. Forced parental involvement laws are part of that framework in Republican-majority legislatures like the one in Florida.

The Florida Supreme Court has struck down parental consent laws—once in 1989 and again in 2003—stating that the anti-choice measures violate the state’s constitutional right to privacy and a minor’s right to abortion care. In 2004, voters approved a constitutional amendment to allow for parental notification laws, essentially overruling the 2003 decision. Lawmakers wasted no time passing a law requiring parental notification 48 hours prior to a minor’s abortion; one that still holds, Planned Parenthood advocates pointed out.

Erichsen said lawmakers’ arguments make no sense. “I keep hearing Republican legislators say that teens aren’t mature enough to make the decision on their own,” she said. “I think that’s just so ignorant. If teens aren’t mature enough to make that decision on their own, how are they mature enough to be parents or mature enough to navigate the legal system by themselves?”

She discussed her abortion with her mother several years later, after her mother recovered from addiction. “She was supporting, accepting and upset that she wasn’t able to be there for me,” Erichsen said.

Source: https://rewire.news/article/2019/03/28/teenagers-abortion-rights-are-about-to-be-further-eroded-in-florida/

States across the country are preparing for a possible day when Roe v. Wade is overturned.

Roe, the 1973 Supreme Court decision, specifies that a woman has a right to an abortion, and states are not allowed to interfere with that right. But abortion activists — both for and against — say the high court will be forced to rule on it in upcoming sessions.

Five states have already outlawed abortions with “trigger laws,” legislation that isn’t active unless Roe v. Wade is no longer in effect. “Trigger laws” are a way to ensure that abortion will be automatically illegal in the event that states are allowed to regulate the procedure.

Another eight states have introduced bills this legislative session that, if passed, would also outlaw abortion. Though three of those aren’t technically “trigger laws, all will be inactive unless Roe becomes ineffective, either through a full repeal or a handful of small anti-abortion-rights decisions.

“Trigger laws” date back to the year Roe was decided, and one or two conservative states have historically introduced them every legislative session. But those measures failed. This year has been different.

“There’s been so much more this year,” Elizabeth Nash, a senior state issues manager at the Guttmacher Institute, said. “And these are getting attention. They’re not just getting introduced and fizzling out like they used to.”

Liberal states are also preparing for a post-Roe v Wade world, passing laws that would maintain or expand access to abortion. In New York, lawmakers passed the “Reproductive Health Act” in January, which protects access to abortions after 24 weeks if the fetus is not viable or if there is risk to the mother’s health. Similar proactive laws in New Mexico, Virginia, Vermont have been introduced and gained traction.

The following is a list of every state that has enacted or proposed a “trigger law” or a full ban on abortion.

States that have enacted “abortion ban” laws

Arkansas

Name of law: Act 180, “An Act to Create the Arkansas Human Life Protection Act; to Abolish Abortion in Arkansas and Protect the Lives of Unborn Children; and for Other Purposes.”

Date passed: February 19, 2019

In February, Arkansas become the fifth state to have a “trigger law” on its books. It states “abortion in Arkansas is abolished” in the event that Roe v. Wade is overturned and does not make exceptions for rape or incest.

The legislation also implores the Supreme Court to reconsider Roe v. Wade. Act 180 likens abortion access rights to that of racial segregation laws, stating “a crime against humanity occurs when a government withdraws legal protection from a class of human beings resulting in severe deprivation of their rights.”

“The State of Arkansas urgently pleads with the United States Supreme Court to do the right thing, as they did in one of their greatest cases, Brown v. Board of Education, which overturned a fifty-eight year-old precedent of the United States, and reverse, cancel, overturn, and annul Roe v. Wade, Doe v. Bolton, and Planned Parenthood v. Casey,” Act 180 reads.

Louisiana

Name of law: “Human Life Protection Act”

Year passed: 2006

Louisiana already has some of the most restrictive abortion access laws in the country, but in the event that Roe v. Wade is overturned, the procedure will automatically be illegal. The “Human Life Protection Act” reads that the law would “become effective immediately” in the event a decision by the Supreme Court “reverses, in whole or in part… thereby, restoring to the state of Louisiana the authority to prohibit abortion.” The law does not give exceptions in the case of rape or incest.

A more recent abortion restriction proposed in Louisiana, which would have required abortion providers to obtain admitting privileges at a nearby hospital, was temporarily blocked by the Supreme Court in February. It was the first abortion-related case that Justice Kavanaugh decided on since joining the court last year.

Even though Kavanaugh wrote the dissenting opinion, abortion rights activists didn’t get a clear look into how the new justice may view abortion issues in the future, said Travis Tu, lead counsel on the case for the Center for Reproductive Rights, a pro-abortion rights legal advocacy group.

“Justice Kavanaugh plays his cards very close to the vest in this ruling,” Tu said in a telephone interview with CBS News. “This is just one step in a long game.”

Mississippi

Year enacted: 2007

In the event that the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade, Mississippi’s state attorney general would first have to certify the decision and that “it is reasonably probable that [an abortion ban] would be upheld by the Court as constitutional.” The state’s abortion ban makes exceptions in the event that the mother’s life is at risk and in cases of rape “if a formal charge of rape has been filed with an appropriate law enforcement official.”

Physicians who administer abortions could face between one and ten years in prison, according to the law. Mississippi only has only operational abortion provider.

South Dakota

Year enacted: 2005

South Dakota has had a trigger law in its books for nearly 15 years. The law dictates that physicians are prohibited from administering any kind of abortion — medicinal or surgical — except if the mother’s life is at risk. The law does not make exceptions for rape and incest.

Physicians who perform an abortion would be guilty of committing a Class 6 felony in the state if the law is in effect.

The law notes that the act is only “effective on the date that the states are recognized by the United State Supreme Court to have the authority to regulate or prohibit abortion at all stages of pregnancy,” meaning that as long as Roe v. Wade is in effect, South Dakota’s law isn’t.

North Dakota

Year enacted: 2006

In the event that Roe v. Wade is overturned, administering an abortion would be considered a felony for the provider under North Dakota’s “trigger law.” The law provides exceptions if the women’s life is in danger or if the abortion “was to terminate a pregnancy that resulted from gross sexual imposition, sexual imposition, sexual abuse of a ward, or incest.”

North Dakota has only one operating abortion clinic.

States with proposed “abortion ban” laws

Georgia

Name of law: House Bill 546

Date proposed: February 28, 2019

Status: It was read a second time in the state’s House of Representatives on March 1, 2019. It hasn’t been assigned to a committee yet.

Unlike other “trigger laws,” Georgia’s legislation is a simple ban on abortion. The proposed law calls for up to 10 years in prison and a fine of as much as $100,000 for physicians who perform one.

Because the bill doesn’t explicitly say this law only goes into effect if Roe v. Wade is overturned, it can’t be considered a true “trigger law,” said Nash. The bill includes exceptions for rape, incest and medical emergencies.

When it was proposed in February, Democrats and pro-abortion rights advocates criticized the legislation. In response to it and another restrictive bill on reproductive rights, one Georgia lawmaker said she plans to introduce a “Testicular Bill of Rights.” It was inspired by “what the reaction would be from some males and male legislators if the tables were turned and we started to talk about their reproductive rights and organs,” said Democratic Rep. Dar’shun Kendrick, who plans to introduce the legislation.

Kentucky

Name of law: House Bill 148, “AN ACT related to abortion”

Date proposed: January 10, 2019

Status: Delivered to Gov. Matt Bevin on March 14, 2019 who is anticipated to sign it into law.

Kentucky’s abortion ban is a traditional “trigger law.” The legislation reads that no person may “administer to, prescribe for, procure for, or sell to any pregnant woman any medicine, drug or other substance with the specific intent of causing or abetting the termination of the life of an unborn human being.” The law also specifies that doctors may not “use or employ any instrument or procedure upon a pregnant woman with the specific intent of causing or abetting the termination of the life of an unborn human being.”

The law would make performing an abortion a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison for a health provider. It does not make exceptions in cases of rape or incest, but does make an exception if the woman’s life is in danger.

Tennessee

Name of law: House Bill 1029, “Human Life Protection Act”; Senate Bill 1257, “Human Life Protection Act”

Date proposed: House Bill – February 6, 2019; Senate Bill – February 7, 2019

Status: House Bill – referred to committee on February 13, 2019; Senate Bill – referred to committee on February 11, 2019. If the bill is successfully voted out of committee, each respective chamber will vote on the bill.

Lawmakers in Tennessee introduced matching bills in the House and Senate with the same objective: outlawing abortion in the event that Roe v. Wade is overturned. Both bills say, “a person who performs or attempts to perform an abortion commits the offense of criminal abortion. Criminal abortion is a Class C felony.”

The legislation gives exception to when the woman’s life is in danger, and specifically notes that mental health concerns would not qualify for exceptions.

The bill also notes that a full repeal of Roe v. Wade isn’t necessary for the law to go into effect. Many abortion rights scholars believe a full, clean overturn of the landmark Supreme Court case is unlikely and anticipate a slow chipping away at the decision that would eventually render it ineffective. In Tennessee, lawmakers have considered this possibility and included it in their bill.

Oklahoma

Name of law: Senate Bill 195, “Personhood Act”

Date proposed: February 4, 2019

Status: Passed in the Senate on March 14, 2019. It nows goes to the House for a vote.

The original language of Senate Bill 195 was that of a traditional “trigger law,” outlawing abortions in the state in the event that Roe v. Wade is ever overturned. However, the bill was updated to instead put that to voters, proposing a state ballot measure that would amend Oklahoma’s constitution to say that the state didn’t secure or protect the right to perform or receive an abortion. The bill clarifies that it “concerns only the rights guaranteed by the Oklahoma Constitution” and “would not alter any rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution.”

The bill makes exceptions for when the woman’s health or life is at risk, the fetus has died, or in the events of criminal assault on the mother.

This bill is one of a handful of pieces of anti-abortion legislation that lawmakers in Oklahoma have introduced this session, each with slightly different nuances and success rates. One proposal, Senate Bill 13, would reclassify abortion as murder, but it was killed in committee by Republican state Senator Jason Smalley.

South Carolina

Name of law: “The Personhood Act of South Carolina” House Bill 3289, Senate Bill 485

Date proposed: House Bill – January 8, 2019; Senate Bill – February 6, 2019

Status: House Bill was referred to the Committee on Judiciary on January 8, 2019; Senate Bill referred to the Committee on Judiciary on February 6, 2019. If the bill is successfully voted out of committee, each respective chamber will vote on the bill.

Unlike other bills, South Carolina’s proposed abortion banlegislations in the House and Senate aren’t true “trigger laws” because they don’t clarify that they only take effect if Roe v. Wade is overturned. Instead, these bills seek to “establish that the right to life for each born and preborn human being vests at fertilization.”

By defining the beginning of life at fertilization, the proposals would effectively prohibit abortion, granting that the unborn can’t be “deprived of life without due process of law nor denied the equal protection of the laws.”

The House bill makes exceptions for when the mother’s life is at risk, and specifically clarifies that the bill would not impact access to birth control methods. The Senate’s legislation has similar exceptions, but it also proposes that having or performing an abortion be deemed a felony, referring to abortion as “the shedding of innocent blood.”

South Carolina lawmakers, including the lawmaker who proposed the Senate bill, have introduced several “personhood” measures in the statehouse in previous sessions, but all have failed to pass.

Missouri

Name of law: House Bill No. 126, “Missouri Stands for the Unborn Act”

Date proposed: Prefiled on December 3, 2018

Status: The state’s House of Representatives passed the bill on February 27, 2019. It now goes to the Senate for a vote.

Missouri’s abortion ban is part of House Bill 126, a wide-reaching piece of legislation that aims to restrict abortion access in the state. As it relates to Roe v Wade, its intention is clear: “This bill specifies that if there is in any change in federal law or court decisions that allow it, it is the intent of the state of Missouri that abortion shall not be permitted in the state under any circumstances,” the bill reads.

The bill makes exceptions for “medical emergency,” but not for rape or incest. Doctors who continue to perform abortions would be subject to a felony charge.

Even if Roe v Wade remains the law of the land, other pieces of House Bill 126 would further reduce abortion access in Missouri. The bill includes a ban on abortion based on race, sex or genetic abnormality as well as a requirement that both parents be notified if a minor receives the procedure.
The state already has some of the most restrictive abortion access laws in the country. Missourians seeking an abortion are subject to a 72-hour waiting period and only one abortion clinic exist in the state.

Indiana

Name of law: House Bill No. 1430, “Protection of Life”

Date proposed: January 15, 2019

Status: Referred to the Committee on Public Policy on February 15, 2019. If the bill is successfully out of committee, it’ll go to the full House for a vote.

Indiana’s proposed legislation goes several steps past other states’ “trigger law.” The “Protection of Life” bill refines that life begins “when a human ovum is fertilized by a human sperm” and “any act, law, treaty, order, rule or regulation for the United States government that fails to protect a person’s inalienable right to life in null, void, and unenforceable in Indiana.” In other words, the bill proposes that Indiana not recognize Roe v Wade.

The bill would also augments the definition of “child” to also include “an unborn child,” which effectively redefines abortion as murder in the state. There are no exceptions given for medical emergency, rape or incest.

Texas

Name of law: House Bill 896, “Abolition of Abortion” Act

Date proposed: January 17, 2019

Status: The bill was introduced in January, but has not been assigned to committee.

Similar to Indiana’s proposed legislation, Texas House Bill 896 aims to outlaw all abortions “regardless of any contrary federal law, executive order, or court decision.” The bill’s strategy is to redefine the beginning of life as the “moment of fertilization,” thereby making abortion akin to murder. The bills text specifies that both the mother and the doctor could be held liable.

House Bill 896’s sponsor, Representative Tony Tinderholt, introduced identical legislation in 2017, but that bill failed to pass.

Source: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/abortion-laws-by-state-2019-abortion-automatically-illegal-in-these-states-roe-vs-wade-overturned-2019-03-19/

The Hungarian “conference demonstrates the insidious connections between authoritarian governments, far-right nationalists, and anti-choice movements who conspire to strip women and gender diverse people of their rights.”

Under Orbán’s leadership, Hungary has chipped away at access to abortion care.

Trump administration officials and prominent anti-choice activists appeared at a conference hosted by the Hungarian Embassy earlier this month designed to promote government policies to encourage women to have more babies.

The “Make Families Great Again” conference, which was held at the Library of Congress on March 14, promoted far-right Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s seven-point “Family Protection Action Plan.” The plan is “designed to promote marriage and families and spawn a baby boom” through financial incentives, according to a Washington Post report on the event. White House special assistant Katy Talento, White House Strategic Communications Director Mercedes Schlapp, and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Senior Advisor Valerie Huber spoke at the event.

HHS spokesperson Caitlin Oakley confirmed Huber’s attendance at the event to Rewire.News. Huber, best known as an abstinence-only activist who helped rebrand abstinence-only sexual education as “sexual risk avoidance,” has held several high-level political positions within HHS. She was appointed senior policy advisor at the department’s Office of Global Affairs in January.

Talento, who works on the president’s domestic policy agenda, has pushed myths about contraception, including false statements that contraceptives cause abortions, miscarriages, and reduced fertility. She reportedly helped craft the Trump administration’s policy to roll back the Affordable Care Act’s birth control benefit.

According to a schedule tweeted by Katalin Novák, the Hungarian state secretary for family and youth affairs, three members of Congress—U.S. Reps. Andy Harris (R-MD), Paul Gosar (R-AZ), and Chris Smith (R-NJ)—gave the event’s closing remarks. Requests to their offices for comment were not returned.

Under Orbán’s leadership, Hungary has chipped away at access to abortion care. In 2011 the Hungarian parliament succeeded in inserting personhood language giving fetuses legal recognition into the country’s constitution. And in 2012 the government refused to make medication abortion available in the country.

Tony Perkins, president of the anti-choice and anti-LGBTQ Family Research Council, also spoke at the event, as did representatives from the Heritage Foundation and Concerned Women for America. Perkins praised Hungary’s commitment to what he called “pro-family” policies in a blog post the day after the event, though he noted that the United States isn’t likely to support direct subsidies to increase the birth rate.

Robert Berschinski, senior vice president of policy for nonpartisan advocacy group Human Rights First, suggested according to the Washington Post that “Hungary’s birth plan is at odds with accepted best practices in other countries.”

“The critique is—in effect and by design—it does not encourage women to rejoin the labor force, but keeps them home and pregnant in more of a traditionalist sense through financial incentives,” said Berschinski, who previously served as deputy assistant secretary of state for democracy and human rights and “helped lead U.S. policy toward Hungary in 2016,” according to the Post.

According to a Christian Post report, Orbán’s plan is designed to boost the country’s birth rate to “replacement level,” the fertility rate at which a population sustains itself, without taking a more open approach to immigration policy. Hungary “spends nearly 5 percent of its GDP towards incentives for those in the predominantly-Christian nation to get married and have children—lots of them,” the Christian Postreported.

“Orbán is really quite scary,” Amanda Klasing, acting co-director of the women’s rights division at Human Rights Watch, said in an interview with Rewire.News. “Our big concern is that this anti-gender equality, anti-woman, anti-LGBT rhetoric is being picked up in all of these different places by leaders that are prepared to undermine human rights. And this is one way that they’re doing it. The Trump administration is embracing Hungary’s approach to reproduction with the tacit approval of its efforts to undermine the civil society working on women’s rights.”

Hungary’s programs have reportedly drawn interest from the Trump administration and U.S. conservatives who support its anti-choice and anti-LGBTQ priorities. “We are working closely with the U.S. administration on family issues,” Novák, who gave a keynote address at the event, told the Christian Post. “They would also like to get some detail on our pro-family policies and the measures that we have introduced in the last nine years.”

Cooperation between the two governments sparked alarm from Shannon Kowalski, director of advocacy and policy at the International Women’s Health Coalition. “The ‘Making Families Great Again’ conference demonstrates the insidious connections between authoritarian governments, far-right nationalists, and anti-choice movements who conspire to strip women and gender diverse people of their rights,” she said in a statement to Rewire.News. “Under Viktor Orbán, Hungary has systematically dismantled efforts to achieve gender equality and provide women with the information and services they need to exercise control over their bodies and lives.”

Kowalski tied the event’s agenda directly to efforts by the Trump administration to roll back global support for women’s rights and gender equality at the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women last week. “The Trump administration has now brought this extreme agenda to negotiations at the Commission on the Status of Women, where they have tried to put the rights of ‘the family’ above those of women and girls. It’s important that people see these efforts for what they are: a brazen attempt by ideologues in the Trump administration to rob women of their agency and choice.”

According to Klasing, it’s impossible to separate Hungary’s anti-immigration policies from its anti-choice domestic agenda. “Xenophobia and racism plays out on policies related to women’s bodies,” she told Rewire.News. “There’s so much more that goes into the choice to whether or not to have a family, or whether or not to give birth. There’s so many policies that could improve families and that’s not what this is about. This is about controlling women’s bodies.”

Source: https://rewire.news/article/2019/03/25/trump-officials-attend-hungarian-conference-to-promote-women-having-more-babies/

The Trump administration is trying to exclude abortion providers, so the state is trying to fund its own Title X program.

On Saturday, the Maryland House of Delegates passed a bill that would end the state’s participation in Title X, if the administration prevents the program’s federal family planning funds from going to clinics like Planned Parenthood that provide abortion or refer patients for abortion elsewhere. Instead, beginning in 2021, the governor would be instructed to set aside more state dollars to effectively create its own family planning program.

In 2017, Gov. Larry Hogan (R) signed a bill that created a state-based family planning program, in case the federal government decided to impose a gag rule. This new bill takes an additional step, declaring Maryland would not participate in a program that provides substandard care, explained Robyn Elliott, lobbyist for Planned Parenthood of Maryland.

“This is really about equity across Maryland,” Elliott told ThinkProgress. “Maryland has worked for many years to ensure everyone has access to a broad range of evidence-based contraception…. Why would we leave a part of Maryland out in terms of having access to the same high standard of care?”

The Maryland Department of Health receives between $3 million and $4 million dollars annually from the federal government under the Title X program, Elliott said. The state doles out these federal dollars to various providers, including eight Planned Parenthood clinics. Should the administration’s rule barring abortion providers from participating in Title X take effect, the state would no longer be able to dispense federal dollars to these clinics.

Under current law, federal dollars can’t pay for abortion services. Providers use Title X dollars to pay for other health services like contraception, pelvic exams, and cervical or breast cancer screenings. In 2010, Title X clinics prevented 53,450 cases of chlamydia, 8,810 cases of gonorrhea, 250 cases of HIV, 1,900 cases of cervical cancer, and 6,920 cases of pelvic inflammatory disease, according to the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association.

But the Trump administration argues that by allowing providers like Planned Parenthood to participate in the Title X program, federal officials are basically subsidizing abortion. (It’s worth noting Title X-funded clinics receive more money from Medicaid, a federal-state insurance program for low-income people.)

The administration’s new rule, issued in early March, fundamentally reshapes the country’s sole grant program dedicated to family planning. The grant program would require providers to physically and financially separate abortion from other medical services. Providers wouldn’t even be able to provide abortion referrals during pregnancy counseling. The administration is also giving crisis pregnancy centers an opportunity at receiving federal dollars, even though these centers have a history of misleading patients. Under the Trump administration, the Title X program would emphasize fertility awareness and abstinence education.

The administration is mirroring what conservative states have long tried to do. In 2011, Texas excluded Planned Parenthood from a Medicaid-based program that served around 244,000 women. Within a year, 82 clinics closed, a third of them run by Planned Parenthood.

“The exclusion of Planned Parenthood affiliates…in Texas was associated with adverse changes in the provision of contraception,” a 2016 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found. “For women using injectable contraceptives, there was a reduction in the rate of contraceptive continuation and an increase in the rate of childbirth covered by Medicaid.”

Under the proposed bill, Maryland would create a state-based family program that continues to include abortion providers like Planned Parenthood.

“We want to make sure Marylanders who get family planning services under Title X have access to the very same methods as people with private insurance. It’s that plain and simple,” said state Rep. Shane Pendergrass (D), sponsor of the Maryland Title X bill.

“… Because of the federal rules, they will no longer have that access under Title X. So it’s time to walk away from the federal Title X dollars,” she added.

ThinkProgress reached out to the governor’s office for comment on the bill, but did not hear back by the time of publication.

Maryland is likely the first state aiming to mitigate the gag rule’s damage through legislative action. The state is also one of 21 others suing the administration over the rule. There are currently at least six lawsuits challenging the administration’s changes to the Title X program.

“We are singularly focused on and confident that the courts will block this unlawful regulation. Communities across the country recognize the peril that will befall their most marginalized residents if this rule takes effect. We are all fighting to protect providers and their patients however possible, and our hope is that our legal action will make it so that states don’t have to bear this burden, and many will be unable to do so,” Jessica Marcella, vice president of advocacy and communications at the National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association, said in a statement to ThinkProgress.

Most legal experts think these lawsuits will have a tough time prevailing in federal court, as the Supreme Court previously upheld a similar Regan-era regulation.

Source: https://thinkprogress.org/maryland-bill-could-become-first-state-to-stop-participating-in-title-x-program-after-trump-gag-rule-abortion-a262ae1a3ad9/

In the most restrictive nations, women who terminate their pregnancies face lengthy jail terms

Women in England and Wales have had the right to seek an abortion since 1968, but more than 50 years on, many women around the world do not have the same choice.

A 2017 report by the Guttmacher Institute, which studies reproductive health laws, found that 42% of women of reproductive age live in countries where abortion is either banned or only allowed in specific circumstances.

The most common legal grounds for abortion worldwide is to protect the life of the mother, followed by serious risk to her physical or mental health.

Around half of the countries in the world allow abortion in cases where the pregnancy was the result of rape or incest, and a similar proportion recognise serious foetal abnormality.

However, in a few countries, abortion remains the ultimate taboo.

Which countries have the strictest abortion laws?

All but a handful of countries allow an abortion to be performed when the life of the mother is at risk. The exceptions are Malta, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Dominican Republic

Strongly Catholic Malta is the only European country to have a total ban on abortion, and a survey carried out last year by Malta Today suggests that liberalisation is a long way off.

Overall, 95.2% of those surveyed were opposed to abortion by request – known as elective abortion – even if it were restricted to the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. Less than half said that abortion should be allowed to save the life of the mother.

El Salvador’s harsh anti-abortion laws have come into the international spotlightin recent years, due to high-profile cases of women imprisoned for terminating their pregnancies, some of whom claimed to have actually suffered a miscarriage.

Unsurprisingly, abortion is also totally banned in Vatican City – however, given that the Holy See’s 800-strong population is overwhelmingly made up of Catholic clerics, this prohibition is largely theoretical.

Where is elective abortion legal?

At the other end of the scale, 63 countries and territories permit women to terminate their pregnancies at their request, although usually with some conditions – most commonly, a time limit on when the procedure can be performed.

Canada is the only Western nation where a woman can seek an elective abortion at any time in her pregnancy, although in practice only a handful of terminations occur during the third trimester, HuffPost reports.

What about the UK?

In all parts of the UK except Northern Ireland, women can freely obtain an abortion up to 24 weeks into their pregnancy. Terminations can be performed after this limit in exceptional circumstances, such as to save the life of the mother or due to a severe foetal abnormality.

Office for National Statistics and Department of Health and Social Care figures show that in 2017, 192,900 abortions were performed in England and Wales, compared to 679,106 live births.

Figures like these are often used to claim that more than 20% of all pregnancies are terminated. However, The Journal points out that this statistic is misleading as it does not take into account the thousands of pregnancies which end in miscarriage every year.

Source: https://www.theweek.co.uk/100132/countries-where-abortion-is-legal-and-where-it-is-totally-illegal?fbclid=IwAR1AVp4nUYyPq01LeyDm65IiRCg59lzmH_q2xXbM8YI2vXsx9A9g-EMK0bw

Democrats on the HELP committee join a growing chorus of congressional criticism of the “gag rule,” which is set to go into effect on May 3.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), the committee’s ranking member, voiced support for a hearing.
Mark Wilson / Getty Images

A group of Senate Democrats sent a letter on Monday to committee leadership demanding a hearing on the Trump administration’s newly finalized rule restricting family planning funding, dubbed the domestic “gag rule” by opponents.

Democrats on the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) explained their concern that the anti-choice restriction would force providers to violate medical ethics by banning referrals for abortion care. The letter also says that the rule’s requirement that clinics physically and financially separate Title X-funded family planning services from abortion services “appears to be aimed at and would disproportionately affect Planned Parenthood health centers, which currently serve over 40% of Title X network patients.” The letter says this could present a burden to other providers if Planned Parenthood, the country’s largest provider of Title X services, is cut from the program.

“The effects of this requirement would be devastating nationwide and in our home states,” the senators wrote. “We urge you to hold a hearing so we can fulfill our responsibility to scrutinize the policy with the due diligence it deserves …. The Committee should hear from patients, providers, entities receiving Title X funds, and state and local health departments, so we can directly assess the impact this final rule will have on people with low incomes’ ability to access high-quality family planning services.”

The letter was addressed to Committee Chair Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), the committee’s ranking member. It was signed by Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Doug Jones (D-AL), Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), and the seven other non-ranking Democrats on the HELP committee.

Murray voiced support for a hearing in a statement to Rewire.News. “I’m incredibly alarmed by President Trump’s rule that jeopardizes care for millions of women and families by undermining the historically bipartisan Title X program, and I support my colleagues’ request for greater scrutiny of this alarming plan,” she said. “Republicans should listen to the women, men, health care providers, city and county health officials, religious groups, and many other people across the country who have spoken up in opposition to President Trump’s harmful rule.”

Alexander did not respond to a request for comment from Rewire.News by the time of publication.

Democrats on the HELP committee join a growing chorus of congressional criticism of the gag rule, which is set to go into effect on May 3. Democrats on the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee sent a letter to U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar earlier this month questioning the rule’s legality.

Lawsuits seeking to prevent the rule’s implementation are starting to pile up. The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit in early March on behalf of the National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association (NFPRHA) and Cedar River Clinics, a family planning provider based in Washington state. The Center for Reproductive Rights filed its own lawsuit on behalf of Maine Family Planning, the state’s sole recipient of the Title X family planning funds targeted by the administration. Attorneys general from 21 states are also filing suit against the rule.

NFPRHA Communications Director Audrey Sandusky expressed gratitude for congressional pushback against the gag rule in a statement to Rewire.News. “The Title X rule comes with enormous risk and sacrifice to the public’s health,” she said. “It attacks highly qualified providers and threatens the health and wellbeing of those served by this critical program. We are grateful to our champions on the Hill who can help shine a harsh light on the deeply troubling provisions and justifications of the rule that will directly impact the provision of family planning care in this country.”

Source: https://rewire.news/article/2019/03/20/senate-democrats-call-for-hearing-on-trumps-domestic-gag-rule/

Tennessee City Officials Are Using Zoning Rules to Erode Access to Abortion

Carafem opened the Mt. Juliet clinic after seeing a spike in Nashville visitors to their Atlanta location. Last year, Nashville’s last two abortion clinics closed.
CityofMtJuliet / YouTube

The day after carafem, a provider of reproductive health-care services, opened in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, a city council meeting was called. The lone council agenda item: a zoning amendment restricting surgical abortions to industrial areas.

The new carafem clinic, located in a commercial area, would be affected. The amendment passed unanimously. The hastily scheduled meeting lasted a grand total of four minutes.

Carafem hasn’t released a statement regarding what threat the zoning could pose to surgical abortions, which are not yet offered at the Mt. Juliet location, outside Nashville. The clinic today offers medication abortion and plans to offer abortion procedures.

“Writing zoning laws to deny access to essential health care is unfair and mean-spirited,” said Ashley Coffield, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Tennessee and North Mississippi. “I’m not aware of any other community in Tennessee that has used this approach to hurt a qualified medical provider that is just trying to help women get the care they need.”

Carafem opened the Mt. Juliet clinic after seeing a spike in Nashville visitors to their Atlanta location. Last year, Nashville’s last two abortion clinics closed. The Women’s Center closed in August, and Planned Parenthood temporarily stopped providing abortion care in December. While Planned Parenthood has resumed abortion services, the clinic is taking on fewer appointments but plans to ramp up soon. Meanwhile, Tennessee Republicans recently passed a so-called heartbeat bill—amounting to a total abortion ban—through the state house. The legislation would make abortion illegal as early as six weeks, before some people know they’re pregnant.

Reproductive rights and health care are under fire and Mt. Juliet officials are testing the legal temperature.

Ed Hagerty, the mayor of Mt. Juliet, is adamant that the last-minute zoning amendment had nothing to do with boxing out the new abortion clinic. When asked about the relation, he demurred. “All the city officials did was to amend the zoning ordinance, which all municipalities do from time to time,” he said. “The zoning ordinance exists to provide for the health, safety, and well-being of all citizens of Mt. Juliet, including those who are not yet citizens, whether they are visitors traveling through our city or those who may be moving here in the future.”

While Hagerty hasn’t shared his personal views on abortion, in 2015, he served as a judge for an annual anti-choice oratory contest for high school students, put on by the Tennessee chapter of the National Right to Life, the nation’s oldest and largest anti-choice organization.

Some Mt. Juliet city commissioners are more open about the intent of their zoning amendment. “If there is anything we can legally do to keep them [carafem] from opening in Mt. Juliet we will do it. I realize they have rights, but my constituents and I don’t want it here,” commissioner Brian Abston told local television station WTVF.

Commissioner James Maness agreed, sharing his thoughts on Facebook, “I am pro-life. The taking of innocent life is called murder. Abortion is not a matter of choice, it’s a matter of life and how we value life.” Hinting at the legal battle to come, Maness added: “Please don’t think this is over.”

Efforts to restrict access to abortion aren’t new in Tennessee. After Republicans gained a legislative supermajority in 2012, attempts to erode access soared. In the years following the Republican takeover, anti-choice bills, including a law requiring state-directed counseling and a 48-hour forced waiting period, entered the Tennessee legislature. The biggest change to abortion rights came in 2014 when Amendment 1, an amendment giving the state power to create and alter abortion laws, passed and added the following language to the state’s constitution: “nothing in this Constitution secures or protects a right to abortion or requires the funding of an abortion.” Its passage opened the floodgates for GOP-backed anti-choice legislation.

Despite the effort to drive out abortion providers, carafem is ready to provide health care services to those in need.

“Our doors remain open, as we continue to provide much needed reproductive health-care services, including access to abortion and contraception, to the women in and around the Nashville area,” said Melissa Grant, carafem’s chief operating officer. “We are overwhelmed by the number of clients who have expressed their gratitude for having access to the much-needed products and services we provide without having to travel hours to another clinic or state. We remain committed to serving women and couples in Tennessee, who truly need access to safe, affordable reproductive health care and family planning.”

Mt. Juliet residents are torn about the action taken against the abortion provider by the mayor and council.

“I can see why they want to [push out the abortion clinic], because we don’t want to be known as ‘Mt. Juliet, the place where you go to get an abortion,’ but at the same time, it is a medical procedure. There are a lot of components to it,” Tammy Drake, 49, a Mt. Juliet resident, told Rewire.News. “I try not to judge anyone because you don’t know what they’re going through, but on the other hand, I am a God-fearing woman.”

Another Mt. Juliet resident, Linda Sloan, 70, was happy to hear about the effort to drive out an abortion care provider. “I’m very proud to live in a community where abortion is a concern of the mayor and city council members. I’m glad I live in a conservative area where we stand up for unborn babies,” Sloan said.

Kevin Williams, also a city resident, told Rewire.News the city council’s decision “sounds contradictory.”

“If the clinic was permitted initially, then it should stay. I don’t like that—the backtrack. It seems like they made a last-minute change, perhaps due to pressure. And as far as the clinic, I don’t see a problem with it being there,” Williams, 25, said. “It’s up to the woman. A woman has to go through the nine months, the pain that me as a guy will never experience, so I don’t have any problem with the clinic. It’s totally the woman’s decision.”

Source: https://rewire.news/article/2019/03/15/tennessee-city-officials-are-using-zoning-rules-to-erode-abortion-access/