You've probably heard it before, politicians declaring that they want to make their state "abortion free."
Governor Phil Bryant of Mississippi has often stated that he wants to end abortion in Mississippi.
Unfortunately for the women of the state, Gov. Bryant and others have made Mississippi dangerously close to becoming the first state post Roe which would have no abortion clinic.
Of course this doesn't mean that Mississippi will be an abortion free state at all- it just means that women in Mississippi will have no place in their state where they can obtain a safe legal procedure. As more and more states look to enact legislation requiring admitting privileges, the number of clinics able to meet this unnecessary and frivolous requirement are minimal at best because hospitals can deny these privileges simply because they want to.
This battle has been going on for over a year in Mississippi. U.S. District Judge Daniel P. Jordan III let the law take effect in July 2012, after the clinic sued the state. Judge Jordan blocked the state from closing the clinic however, while it tried to comply. Now the clinic is back in court fighting to keep its doors open after area hospitals have refused to grant admitting privileges to the clinics doctors. I strongly encourage you to view my post on admitting privileges before continuing (if you haven't already) as it explains what the admitting privilege requirements really mean and why the only purpose for them to exist is to force clinics to close. In short, admitting privileges have nothing to do with the quality of care, competency of the doctor and lack of said privileges does not prevent patients with abortion related complications from receiving care- at all. Patients cannot be turned away if they haven't been sent by a doctor with admitting privileges and there is no added benefit to any patient who has been referred to a hospital by a doctor with admitting privileges.
The court is now faced with the decision of whether or not the admitting privilege requirement can be enforced while simultaneously avoiding creating an "undue burden." Confused? I don't blame you. If the admitting privilege requirement is enforced the only clinic in Mississippi providing abortion services will be forced to shut down. Shutting down the last clinic which provides LEGAL abortions in the state of Mississippi could be construed as an undue burden as it is forcing women to go out of state to obtain abortion services. As far as the undue burden aspect we must look to the case of Planned Parenthood v Casey which was decided in 1992. Though the ruling did hold the basic principle of Roe v Wade- that abortion would remain legal in the United States up to "viability," the ruling also granted states the right to impose restrictions on how and when and under what circumstances women would be allowed to obtain abortions. Since the term "undue burden" is entirely subjective (look HERE to the case in Texas where a Judge stated women would not be inconvenienced by a lack of access to clinics because they could just "drive faster") what can and cannot be considered an undue burden is highly subjective.
Because there are states with pending admitting privileges legislation and states with this legislation that have already been deemed "constitutional" under appeal (ahem, Texas), it is difficult to predict what the outcome will be in Mississippi. If the court upholds the admitting privilege requirements then the last clinic in Mississippi will be forced to close. While Mississippi will be the first state to effectively negate the legality of abortion it will certainly not be the last and as usual the casualties will be women. This is a dangerous road to be going down and as Governor Bryant and other abortion rights foes will find out there is no way to drive the need for abortions out of any state- with or without clinics women will always need abortion services whether or not the state is willing to grant them a safe procedure or not. Mississippi should not be proud to be the first state to deny women that right.
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Monday, April 21, 2014
Admitting Priviledges
Anti-choice folks cried foul when their motives for requiring doctors who provide abortions to obtain admitting privileges at local hospitals were labeled politically motivated. My what a difference six months makes.
For instance, Executive Director for Wisconsin Right to Life, Barbara Lyons stated: "The 5th Circuit decision matters because the admitting privileges provision is essential to protect a woman’s health. With no admitting privileges, a woman suffering complications from her abortion is placed in an ambulance and taken to a hospital where no one knows her, her medical records are not available, and she is left to explain why she is there."
With that dramatic descriptive imagery one could be led to believe that abortion clinics ship off the few patients with complications to some unknown place under a shroud of secrecy and shame. I can even picture the ambulance pulling up and a patient emerging on a stretcher, eyes down cast, blood pooling around her gurney and being interrogated by medical professionals who apparently have no idea how to recognize or handle abortion complications. Barbara Lyons would have you believe that without admitting privileges doctors are unable to admit patients with complications leaving women vulnerable and helpless should their surgery go awry.
Anti-women Governor Rick Perry signed legislation in Texas requiring clinics to have at least one doctor with admitting privileges to a hospital within 30 miles (the bill is referred to as HB 2). Upon this action the supporters of reproductive rights knew immediately what forces were at work. Hospital admitting privileges can be granted or denied without any logical reasoning behind the decisions. Some hospitals even have a requirement that Doctors must admit a certain amount of patients once granted the admitting privileges in order to keep them. If you understand how abortion services work you might note immediately that abortion providers often work on a part time basis with clinics and do not admit many patients to local hospitals. In fact, at a recent conference I heard an abortion provider declare that if you are admitting more than one patient per year to the hospital due to complications arising from abortion procedures that you are not a very good provider. Due to safety concerns in certain hostile states, doctors are actually flown in to clinics located in places where an abortion provider would likely face harassment and threats of violence should they reside in the community. If a doctor only goes to a clinic once a week, how likely are they to be granted admitting privileges by the local hospital? Not very. To recap, hospital admitting privileges can be granted or denied for any reason. Hospitals are not required to explain why or why not they choose to grant admitting privileges to some doctors and not to others. Legislation requiring abortion clinics to have doctors with admitting privileges is a ploy to close down clinics and absolutely places undue burdens on the women who lose access to clinics because of this policy. It's been about five months since these new requirements took effect and they have caused the closure of about a third of all abortion clinics in Texas.
Here are some facts:
1. Surgical abortions are safer then giving birth and complications are rare. According to the Guttmacher Institute when performed under proper medical conditions by trained personnel in a hygienic setting, abortion is an extremely safe procedure. Fewer than 1% of all U.S. abortion patients experience a major complication and the risk of death associated with abortion is 10 times as low as that associated with childbirth.
2. Under a 1986 federal law known as EMTALA, hospitals are required to provide, admit and treat anyone who needs emergency care. This requirement includes pregnant women who need a life-saving abortion, are in labor, or are suffering the effects of a botched abortion. Hospitals cannot refuse to treat a women with abortion complications just because her abortion provider did not have a prior "relationship" with the hospital which is all admitting privileges mean anyway.
Furthermore, as Barbara Lyons laments that women will be stranded at hospitals where "no one knows her" and "her medical records are not available," the most pressing question I have is how would that change if a doctor had admitting privileges? The quality of care given to these women should not depend on whether or not anyone at the hospital knows her or not. That sentiment is so far from the point that I am surprised she takes herself seriously. In fact, how long a women has to wait and how far she has e to travel for abortion services is directly related to her care. When Texas decided to require this arbitrary admitting privilege regulation it is placing politics so far above the care of women it is baffling that anyone fails to see the thinly veiled attempt at closing clinics in the name of protecting women.
In fact proponents of the admitting privilege legislation stated that hospitals would not be able to discriminate against abortion providers seeking admitting privileges as many opponents claimed. They stated that the law was only intended to make abortion safer for women and any one who thought otherwise didn't truly care about women's health. Take a look at this articlefrom last Fall. Granted it comes from the extreme "lifenews.com", but even still that goes to further to prove the point that admitting privileges are being used to close clinics, not to make them safer. In the instance of the horrible case of Kermit Gosnell especially, I am hard pressed to see how any admitting privileges would have changed this sick and disturbed individual who is the exception and not the rule when it comes to abortion providers. This article also brings up other controversial issues that aren't explained in much depth either but what I want to highlight is the flawed logic used by the writer and how misleading it is. "Admitting privileges should not be a problem for a good physician to come by," says the author, "the criteria hospitals examine when deciding whether or not to grant admitting privileges to a local physician tend to be board certifications, malpractice history and reported complications, level of experience and expertise, and validation of educational credentials. Bottom line: If a doctor cannot get admitting privileges, then maybe women should be protected from receiving any medical treatment (or mistreatment) from him or her." So it IS about women's health and safety right? Not just a ploy to close clinics...if physicians are granted admitting privileges based on all of the described criteria above than there should be no problem for legitimate providers to gain them. Right? Well, no...
Doctor with over 40 years experience has difficulties gaining admitting privileges.
In addition, it was revealed last week that University General Hospital of Dallas revoked admitting privileges which had been granted to two doctors and specifically stated that it was because these doctors provided abortions. The hospital stated:
"It has come to our attention that you perform 'voluntary interruption of pregnancies' as a regular part of your medical practice. As a matter of policy, UGHD does not perform these procedures due to the fact that obstetric procedures are not within UGHD's scope of services and that UGHD does not have the capacity to treat complications that may arise from voluntary interruption of pregnancies."
NATION NOW
A judge has already issued a temporary injunction against the revocation as both doctors have sued the state of Texas citing a law that prohibits discrimination based on a physicians decision to provide abortion services or not. The law was brought up by supporters of HB 2 as a reason why hospitals would not be allowed to refuse admitting privileges solely on the basis of whether they performed abortions or not. In the lifenews.com article our author claims, "admitting privileges should not be hard for a good physician to come by," so why are they? Could it be because they have little to do with protecting women and a lot to do with hindering abortion access for women?
Texas is not the only state that has used admitting privileges legislation to try to close down clinics. Wisconsin and Mississippi are at various stages of enacting and retrying the controversial admitting privileges requirement. Alabama has passed a similar law that would close down three of the five abortion clinics in the State. The constitutionality of that law is being challenged and a federal judge decided to send the case to trial on May 19th which will determine whether or not the law will take effect in yet another state.
"It really is about the health care of women," Alabama State Senator Scott Beason asserted.
Really? Forgive me if I remain skeptical.
For instance, Executive Director for Wisconsin Right to Life, Barbara Lyons stated: "The 5th Circuit decision matters because the admitting privileges provision is essential to protect a woman’s health. With no admitting privileges, a woman suffering complications from her abortion is placed in an ambulance and taken to a hospital where no one knows her, her medical records are not available, and she is left to explain why she is there."
With that dramatic descriptive imagery one could be led to believe that abortion clinics ship off the few patients with complications to some unknown place under a shroud of secrecy and shame. I can even picture the ambulance pulling up and a patient emerging on a stretcher, eyes down cast, blood pooling around her gurney and being interrogated by medical professionals who apparently have no idea how to recognize or handle abortion complications. Barbara Lyons would have you believe that without admitting privileges doctors are unable to admit patients with complications leaving women vulnerable and helpless should their surgery go awry.
Anti-women Governor Rick Perry signed legislation in Texas requiring clinics to have at least one doctor with admitting privileges to a hospital within 30 miles (the bill is referred to as HB 2). Upon this action the supporters of reproductive rights knew immediately what forces were at work. Hospital admitting privileges can be granted or denied without any logical reasoning behind the decisions. Some hospitals even have a requirement that Doctors must admit a certain amount of patients once granted the admitting privileges in order to keep them. If you understand how abortion services work you might note immediately that abortion providers often work on a part time basis with clinics and do not admit many patients to local hospitals. In fact, at a recent conference I heard an abortion provider declare that if you are admitting more than one patient per year to the hospital due to complications arising from abortion procedures that you are not a very good provider. Due to safety concerns in certain hostile states, doctors are actually flown in to clinics located in places where an abortion provider would likely face harassment and threats of violence should they reside in the community. If a doctor only goes to a clinic once a week, how likely are they to be granted admitting privileges by the local hospital? Not very. To recap, hospital admitting privileges can be granted or denied for any reason. Hospitals are not required to explain why or why not they choose to grant admitting privileges to some doctors and not to others. Legislation requiring abortion clinics to have doctors with admitting privileges is a ploy to close down clinics and absolutely places undue burdens on the women who lose access to clinics because of this policy. It's been about five months since these new requirements took effect and they have caused the closure of about a third of all abortion clinics in Texas.
Here are some facts:
1. Surgical abortions are safer then giving birth and complications are rare. According to the Guttmacher Institute when performed under proper medical conditions by trained personnel in a hygienic setting, abortion is an extremely safe procedure. Fewer than 1% of all U.S. abortion patients experience a major complication and the risk of death associated with abortion is 10 times as low as that associated with childbirth.
2. Under a 1986 federal law known as EMTALA, hospitals are required to provide, admit and treat anyone who needs emergency care. This requirement includes pregnant women who need a life-saving abortion, are in labor, or are suffering the effects of a botched abortion. Hospitals cannot refuse to treat a women with abortion complications just because her abortion provider did not have a prior "relationship" with the hospital which is all admitting privileges mean anyway.
Furthermore, as Barbara Lyons laments that women will be stranded at hospitals where "no one knows her" and "her medical records are not available," the most pressing question I have is how would that change if a doctor had admitting privileges? The quality of care given to these women should not depend on whether or not anyone at the hospital knows her or not. That sentiment is so far from the point that I am surprised she takes herself seriously. In fact, how long a women has to wait and how far she has e to travel for abortion services is directly related to her care. When Texas decided to require this arbitrary admitting privilege regulation it is placing politics so far above the care of women it is baffling that anyone fails to see the thinly veiled attempt at closing clinics in the name of protecting women.
In fact proponents of the admitting privilege legislation stated that hospitals would not be able to discriminate against abortion providers seeking admitting privileges as many opponents claimed. They stated that the law was only intended to make abortion safer for women and any one who thought otherwise didn't truly care about women's health. Take a look at this articlefrom last Fall. Granted it comes from the extreme "lifenews.com", but even still that goes to further to prove the point that admitting privileges are being used to close clinics, not to make them safer. In the instance of the horrible case of Kermit Gosnell especially, I am hard pressed to see how any admitting privileges would have changed this sick and disturbed individual who is the exception and not the rule when it comes to abortion providers. This article also brings up other controversial issues that aren't explained in much depth either but what I want to highlight is the flawed logic used by the writer and how misleading it is. "Admitting privileges should not be a problem for a good physician to come by," says the author, "the criteria hospitals examine when deciding whether or not to grant admitting privileges to a local physician tend to be board certifications, malpractice history and reported complications, level of experience and expertise, and validation of educational credentials. Bottom line: If a doctor cannot get admitting privileges, then maybe women should be protected from receiving any medical treatment (or mistreatment) from him or her." So it IS about women's health and safety right? Not just a ploy to close clinics...if physicians are granted admitting privileges based on all of the described criteria above than there should be no problem for legitimate providers to gain them. Right? Well, no...
Doctor with over 40 years experience has difficulties gaining admitting privileges.
In addition, it was revealed last week that University General Hospital of Dallas revoked admitting privileges which had been granted to two doctors and specifically stated that it was because these doctors provided abortions. The hospital stated:
"It has come to our attention that you perform 'voluntary interruption of pregnancies' as a regular part of your medical practice. As a matter of policy, UGHD does not perform these procedures due to the fact that obstetric procedures are not within UGHD's scope of services and that UGHD does not have the capacity to treat complications that may arise from voluntary interruption of pregnancies."
NATION NOW
A judge has already issued a temporary injunction against the revocation as both doctors have sued the state of Texas citing a law that prohibits discrimination based on a physicians decision to provide abortion services or not. The law was brought up by supporters of HB 2 as a reason why hospitals would not be allowed to refuse admitting privileges solely on the basis of whether they performed abortions or not. In the lifenews.com article our author claims, "admitting privileges should not be hard for a good physician to come by," so why are they? Could it be because they have little to do with protecting women and a lot to do with hindering abortion access for women?
Texas is not the only state that has used admitting privileges legislation to try to close down clinics. Wisconsin and Mississippi are at various stages of enacting and retrying the controversial admitting privileges requirement. Alabama has passed a similar law that would close down three of the five abortion clinics in the State. The constitutionality of that law is being challenged and a federal judge decided to send the case to trial on May 19th which will determine whether or not the law will take effect in yet another state.
"It really is about the health care of women," Alabama State Senator Scott Beason asserted.
Really? Forgive me if I remain skeptical.
Monday, April 14, 2014
#CLPP2014
This weekend I attended the 28th annual conference "From Abortion Right's to Social Justice Building the Movement for Reproductive Freedom." The event is hosted by the Civil Liberties and Public Policy program at Hampshire college.
The experience is described well in the introduction and welcome statement in the conference program. "CLPP is a national reproductive rights and justice organization dedicated to educating, mentoring and inspiring new generations of advocates, leaders and supporters. Combining activism, organizing, leadership training and reproductive rights movement building, CLPP promotes an all inclusive agenda that advances reproductive rights and health and social and economic justice."
A lofty goal no doubt, and one that may have even seemed impossible to me had I not gone and experienced it myself. As challenging as creating an environment of acceptance and education is, the CLPP conference comes the closest I have ever been to experiencing an "all inclusive" agenda.
This annual Spring conference is held at Hampshire College and is put on by Civil Liberties and Public Policy (CLPP). The three day conference starts on Friday night and goes through Sunday afternoon. The conference features an Abortion Speak out as well as workshops on a wide variety of topics. Some examples from this years conference include Creative Solutions to Abortion Restrictions, Queering Reproductive Justice, Invisible: Women in America's Prisons and Jails, Birth Justice, Showing up in Solidarity When Racism and Privileges are the Co-Hosts, Organizing for Reproductive Justice in Religious Communities, The Intersection of Immigrant Rights and Reproductive Justice and MANY MANY MORE...in fact, if I had to criticize the conference structure for anything it would be that their are just too many workshops on the Saturday schedule (three sessions) and not enough on Friday and Sunday (One session each), I would love it if the conference were spread out another day or two just to give participants the opportunity to attend more workshops. I would have loved to have been able to go to another few workshops on topics that weren't my first choice issues but t
Conferences like these are important for both the Reproductive Justice (RJ) field as well as all individuals who want to work towards social justice in any form. There is an incredible amount of topics and resources available at CLPP and it is crucial for discussions to take place around these vital topics. Without the opportunity to be exposed to the experiences and opinions of those unlike ourselves we are unable to grow and thrive as individuals. I appreciated the vast intersectionality that CLPP demonstrated by grouping class, race, gender and gender identity under the large umbrella of Reproductive Rights and Social Justice as a whole.
For me personally, my most memorable experience was having Dr. Susan Robinson (one of only four late term abortion providers in the country) sit next to me during a workshop and chat with her about Crisis Pregnancy Centers. She later gifted me with a necklace made by her husband featuring a tiny copper wire hanger on a black string; reminding us of how far we've come and how much further we have to go in the field of Reproductive Rights.
CLPP 2015 will be held on the Hampshire College campus on April 10-12th. More information can be found here.
The experience is described well in the introduction and welcome statement in the conference program. "CLPP is a national reproductive rights and justice organization dedicated to educating, mentoring and inspiring new generations of advocates, leaders and supporters. Combining activism, organizing, leadership training and reproductive rights movement building, CLPP promotes an all inclusive agenda that advances reproductive rights and health and social and economic justice."
A lofty goal no doubt, and one that may have even seemed impossible to me had I not gone and experienced it myself. As challenging as creating an environment of acceptance and education is, the CLPP conference comes the closest I have ever been to experiencing an "all inclusive" agenda.
This annual Spring conference is held at Hampshire College and is put on by Civil Liberties and Public Policy (CLPP). The three day conference starts on Friday night and goes through Sunday afternoon. The conference features an Abortion Speak out as well as workshops on a wide variety of topics. Some examples from this years conference include Creative Solutions to Abortion Restrictions, Queering Reproductive Justice, Invisible: Women in America's Prisons and Jails, Birth Justice, Showing up in Solidarity When Racism and Privileges are the Co-Hosts, Organizing for Reproductive Justice in Religious Communities, The Intersection of Immigrant Rights and Reproductive Justice and MANY MANY MORE...in fact, if I had to criticize the conference structure for anything it would be that their are just too many workshops on the Saturday schedule (three sessions) and not enough on Friday and Sunday (One session each), I would love it if the conference were spread out another day or two just to give participants the opportunity to attend more workshops. I would have loved to have been able to go to another few workshops on topics that weren't my first choice issues but t
Conferences like these are important for both the Reproductive Justice (RJ) field as well as all individuals who want to work towards social justice in any form. There is an incredible amount of topics and resources available at CLPP and it is crucial for discussions to take place around these vital topics. Without the opportunity to be exposed to the experiences and opinions of those unlike ourselves we are unable to grow and thrive as individuals. I appreciated the vast intersectionality that CLPP demonstrated by grouping class, race, gender and gender identity under the large umbrella of Reproductive Rights and Social Justice as a whole.
For me personally, my most memorable experience was having Dr. Susan Robinson (one of only four late term abortion providers in the country) sit next to me during a workshop and chat with her about Crisis Pregnancy Centers. She later gifted me with a necklace made by her husband featuring a tiny copper wire hanger on a black string; reminding us of how far we've come and how much further we have to go in the field of Reproductive Rights.
CLPP 2015 will be held on the Hampshire College campus on April 10-12th. More information can be found here.
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