Abortion Ban - Myth vs. Reality
Abortion Ban - Myth vs. Reality
Anti-choice propaganda combined with confusing medical and legal terms has obscured the true implications of the U.S. Supreme Court's regressive and dangerous ruling on abortion. The media is having trouble reporting accurately on this hot-button topic, due to its complexity. Some stories even question, or fail to grasp, the importance of this ruling. Make no mistake, last week's Supreme Court decision to uphold the federal abortion ban is a major setback, not just for women's health but for all patients and health-care providers in the United States.The decision to enforce the ban sets a dangerous precedent for political intrusion into our most private decisions about medical care, and it undermines the autonomy of every American. With this ruling, the court has declared, any time there is debate within the medical community, Congress has the right to cast the deciding vote. In essence, the door is open to let Big Brother dictate the type of health care you can (or cannot) receive. Medical decisions should be made by patients in consultation with their physicians, not politicians with an ax to grind or a constituency to impress.
A common misconception about the ban, often reported by the media, is that it is a ban on late term or "partial-birth abortions." In fact, there is no such thing as a "partial-birth abortion." This is not a medical term but rather a made-up slogan designed by anti-choice politicians to paint a misleading image in the public's mind.
In reality, the banned procedure is an intact dilation and evacuation. According to major medical associations such as the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and health-care advocates such as Physicians for Reproductive Choice and Health and Planned Parenthood, for some women in certain cases, it is absolutely the safest abortion method. This method can be used in the second trimester, long before a fetus is "viable" or able to survive outside the womb. Its impact reaches much farther than late term abortions, which are already closely regulated by the state.
Women undergo abortions in the second trimester for a number of health-related reasons. For example, the pregnancy may be harming their health by exacerbating a medical condition, such as a heart condition or kidney failure. Many severe fetal anomalies, such as the lack of a brain or kidneys are not detected, until the second trimester.
In addition to usurping the decision-making power of patients and doctors, the ruling ignores 30 years of well-established Supreme Court precedent. One of the protections codified in Roe vs. Wade, and reaffirmed by the court many times since then, is the need to protect women's health when restricting abortions. By refusing to allow an exception to the ban that would protect women's health, the court has severely undermined one of the key protections in Roe vs. Wade. Under the ban, a woman's life must be in danger before she can receive the type of care that many doctors believe is best.
This clearly goes against the best interests of patients and health-care providers. Most will agree that the point of health care is to protect our health. How can it be ethical to demand that a patient be on the verge of death before a doctor can treat them in the safest way possible? How is a doctor supposed to make this decision in a split second? If the doctor makes the wrong decision, he or she could face jail time. Is this what you want your doctor worrying about when he or she treats treat you or your daughter?
The restrictions won't end here. This ruling has given the green light to anti-choice politicians to pass all types of new restrictions on abortion. We can expect to see more bans such as the one the South Dakota legislature attempted to push through last year before giving their constituents the chance to vote.
The implications of this ruling are far reaching. Thoughtful citizens should be asking themselves, "What next?" Collectively, we defend a woman's right to make her own reproductive decisions, including the right to a safe and legal abortion, as well as the right of health-care providers, not politicians, to make critical medical decisions. President Bush has stated twice in as many days that politicians should not be telling generals how to do their jobs. They shouldn't be telling doctors either.
Dian Harrison is the president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Golden Gate. Dr. Suzanne Poppema is the chair-elect of Physicians for Reproductive Choice and Health. www.ppgg.org and www.prch.org
© 2007 The San Francisco Chronicle
9 Comments so far
Show Allfollowing chip90043...
We fear, even hate, that which we do not understand. And transgender understanding has always been a bit onesided.
The duality required of life on earth evolved women from earliest childhood to understand -- to develop instinctual judgements of their would be safety with -- this or that man.
Sooo, what shall be the new pressues to cause mens reciprocation, and our evolution beyond such limitations?
Money for the drug companies and power over women.
alamac: I just remember when I was in HS and buses left from my town to go to DC to protest Nixon's war (we saw it that way), i.e. Vietnam. To me that was part of the Woodstock Generation, a moment that had all the qualities of 2nd Renaissance as THOUSANDS of young people, many guys with long hair gathered on the White House lawn and MANY marijuana joints were passed around as we clapped, sang and danced while effigies of Richard Nixon were burned. It always seemed to me that the right wing knew it could not (computers were not as advanced as today, see Bev Harris on voter fraud via computer techniques) directly stop the vote of those that hated its candidates and policies, so they went for "pot." It was a way of disenfranchising a contigency they knew would be against them. I said this before on this site--a government that applauds guns, alcohol, tobacco, porn and violent entertainment owns NO moral high ground to tell a citizen when to end a pregnancy or what they can smoke! Living in the Florida Keys watching property confiscated when Martinez, the "drug czar" under Bush I implemented the "zero tolerance" policy, was watching the beginning decimation of Civil Liberties. It's straight out of, "first they came for..." as a lot of people who prefer beer to grass could care less, so long as their "drug" of choice was not impacted. It's all about power, and the rationales are empty, amoral and care-less.
Great article, but the implication that the Supremes have "opened the door" for "Big Brother" to obstruct the medical decisions of doctors and patients is wrong; that was done long ago when the drugwar began. There are hundreds of thousands of people in jails and penitentiaries for possessing the benign cannabis plant. Many of these are medical users. And the drug fascists in the Bush administration have made the decision to persecute medical cannabis users in California, sending in Federal goon squads to close down providers of the herb which is so necessary to so many.
We are farther down the road toward fascism than most people even begin to realize. But that started years ago; this is just another notable step in that direction.
I know; I am a medical-cannabis user who paid for my illness and its successful treatment with 5 years spent in Federal medical prisons.
One approach that has been proposed is a Constitutional Convention. Here's waht Gore Vidal said about that early in the GWB regime:
Q: So what's the way out of this? Back in the '80s you used to call for a new sort of populist constitutional convention. Do you still believe that's the fix?
Vidal: Well, it's the least bloody. Because there will be trouble, and big trouble. The loons got together to get a balanced-budget amendment, and they got a majority of states to agree to a constitutional convention. Senator Sam Ervin, now dead, researched what would happen in such a convention, and apparently everything would be up for grabs. Once we the people are assembled, as the Constitution requires, we can do anything, we can throw out the whole executive, the judiciary, the Congress. We can put in a Tibetan lama. Or turn the country into one big Scientological clearing center.
And the liberals, of course, are the slowest and the stupidest, because they do not understand their interests. The right wing are the bad guys, but they know what they want -- everybody else's money. And they know they don't like blacks and they don't like minorities. And they like to screw everyone along the way.
But once you know what you want, you are in a stronger position than those who can only say, "Oh no, you mustn't do that." That we must have free speech. Free speech for what? To agree with The New York Times?
The liberals always say, "Oh my, if there is a constitutional convention, they will take away the Bill of Rights." But they have already done it! It is gone. Hardly any of it is left. So if they, the famous "they," would prove to be a majority of the American people and did not want a Bill of Rights, then I say, let's just get it over with. Let's just throw it out the window. If you don't want it, you won't have it.
http://www.meaus.com/gore-vidal-interview.htm
This decision will not save one life and, in fact, may lead to complications and even death for some women. The fetus must still be removed, only now by means of a much more dangerous procedure.
And the grieving parents, mourning not only the loss of their "ideal" baby but also the death of this deformed and nonviable fetus, will be denied a complete body to bury or cremate AND have to deal with the fact that the fetus had to be cut up in utero to extract the pieces. If Kennedy thought the D&X procedure gruesome, the dismemberment option is far more unsettling.
The Supreme Court has made its Draconian decision against the women of this country. Where do we go from here? It is beyond ridiculous to say that the Supreme Court is not political. This ruling is illustrative of just how political it has become. Since the crowning of King George, we have seen all branches of the government lose their power to represent the people of this country. When we lose the power of the Court to the extreme right wing, we have lost our last recourse. Where do we go from here?
I wish we can get the abortion issue out of the body politics. But until woman in this country and around the world get equality and the fear and hatred of woman are remove. We can see more of this. I am afraid that until woman are dropping dead or seriously hurt. Then maybe things will change. I am wondering how did these anti-choice people should be allowed to lie and distort thiings with made up names. with no proof. Someone needs to sue these peole they clearly lied about tis whole issue just to get what they want.
This is one of those issues that the Republican's use to keep their fanatical follower's from seeing all the other damage they are doing to this country!