The Bush Administration’s attack on birth control
Probably the greatest liberation for women came in the form of reliable birth control. With the advent of the birth control pill women were no longer slaves to their reproductive system, having baby after baby, year after year. But, George Bush’s administration wants to change that.
The Department of Health and Human Services has proposed a rule that would require that any health care entity that receives federal financing — whether it’s a physician in private practice, a hospital or a state government — certify in writing that none of its employees are required to assist in any way with medical services they find objectionable.
Health and Human Services estimates that the rule, which would affect nearly 600,000 hospitals, clinics and other health care providers, would cost $44.5 million a year to administer. Astonishingly, the department does not even address the real cost to patients who might be refused access to these critical services. Women patients, who look to their health care providers as an unbiased source of medical information, might not even know they were being deprived of advice about their options or denied access to care. SOURCE
One would think that such a proposed rule would have the supposed bastion of women’s rights, the Democratic Party, up in arms, but that doesn’t appear to be the case. In a letter to the Secretary of HHS, only 28 senators have affixed their signature. The signatories are:
- Senator Patty Murray
- Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton
- Senator Barbara Boxer
- Senator Barack Obama
- Senator Debbie Stabenow
- Senator Maria Cantwell
- Senator Frank R. Lautenberg
- Senator John F. Kerry
- Senator Bernard Sanders
- Senator Robert Menendez
- Senator Charles E. Schumer
- Senator Patrick J. Leahy
- Senator Sherrod Brown
- Senator Claire McCaskill
- Senator Ron Wyden
- Senator Richard J. Durbin
- Senator Sheldon Whitehouse
- Senator Jon Tester
- Senator Barbara A. Mikulski
- Senator Tom Harkin
- Senator Max Baucus
- Senator Dianne Feinstein
- Senator Blanche Lincoln
- Senator Russ Feingold
- Senator Benjamin L. Cardin
- Senator Edward Kennedy
- Senator Harry Reid
- Senator Christopher J. Dodd
The far right wing of the Republican Party, not content to rant and rail against abortion, in an earlier draft of the rule included with abortion commonly used forms of birth control. In the latest version the rule does not attempt to define abortion, thus leaving it open to the individual health care provider to decide if they choose that birth control IS abortion.
The bigger problem with the rule is that it could affect many forms of health care. A health care provider could object to providing an AIDS test or emergency contraception to a rape victim as well as dispensing common birth control means such as the birth control pill or IUDs.
The HHS rule is in conflict with many state laws and in conflict with Medicaid and Title X programs.
The fact is, most Americans – regardless of their position on reproductive choice — agree that increasing access to birth control prevents unintended pregnancies – and results in fewer abortions. As a matter of public policy, it is utterly irresponsible for the federal government to hinder women’s access to contraceptive services.SOURCE
I believe this is a last minute hail Mary effort by the Bush administration to cater to the far right wing fundamentalists. It is shameful pandering that could make obtaining birth control and other procedures difficult if not impossible for millions of Americans.
Please, if you find this HHS rule as reprehensible as I do, contact your representatives and let them know women MUST have full access to medical care.
Comments Off
September 19th, 2008 at 6:42 pm
I respectfully disagree. To compel health care workers to participate in services that go against their morality in a de facto sense discourages morally sensitive people from even being able to accept jobs in medicine. How wise is that? When the two political parties divide along partisan lines over abortion, to suggest that health care workers must support medical practices they believe are immoral is tantamount to making it a requirement for health care workers that they be Democrats.
September 19th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
If McCain doesn’t get out something about this, it will hurt him and Palin. While abortion is fairly low on the list of concerns in the polls, this one is really hot button…
September 19th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
I’m sorry, I have to disagree. Health care is no place for people who can’t treat everyone in an appropriate MEDICALLY called for manner.
If someone doesn’t approve of birth control they don’t have to use it but they shouldn’t be allowed to impose their beliefs on someone else. If I can’t demand women take birth control then they shouldn’t be able to demand women not take it.
That’s the difference in the pro-choice and anti-choice, pro-birth control, anti-birth control camps. I’m not trying to force anyone to use birth control or have an abortion, they ARE trying to force women to bow to their belief. Big difference.
I suggest that those who can’t separate their personal beliefs from their medical duty choose some other field of work.
This reminds me of the Muslim working at Target who didn’t want to check out a customer who had bacon in their cart. Where do we draw the line?
September 20th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
Choice? Really. You are “not forcing anyone to have an abortion.” The establishment of abortion has created an entire industry. It is hardly the “private decision” that its partisans describe. It also led directly to the practice of allowing premature infants of “failed” abortion procedures to die — up until the “born alive legislation” came into place — which Obama opposed in Illinois. Notably these children were no longer “unborn” they were very definitely “born,” when allowed to die — despite the fact that “birth” used to satisfy even Democrats’ ideas of what constitutionally defines a child.
Abortion has changed the whole landscape of medicine. It made people into partisans who favored Terry Schiavo’s death. It leads directly to euthenasia. It has led to embryonic stem cell research. It has other consequences, too. Contempt for nature and the god-like imposition of human engineering upon natural processes: recombinant DNA research, and cloning. How, pray tell, do these technologies relate to “environmentalism”? Have you even noticed the shift that has taken place in a generation?
It used to be “nature” that we protected. Now, it’s “the environment.” Big difference there, I’d say. Al Gore’s enormous personal residence is part of “the environment” while the pristine forest isn’t so much anymore. But should we expect people — expect society — to care about the land, about rivers and streams, forests and wild animals, when they are no longer so very concerned even about their own species.
As Mother Theresa put it so succinctly: “if a mother can take the life of her own child, what is to keep all of us from killing each other?” Our society has undergone a sea change in a generation. I’m not so sure there is very much to prevent us “killing each other,” philosophically speaking.
But perhaps most fundamentally and immediately it has eliminated the “Hypocratic oath” — the idea of “do no harm.” When a doctor has performed hundreds, perhaps thousands of abortions, how does that change him?
Meanwhile, you have not addressed my main point that your notion would require medical workers to be Democrats, pure and simple. The Muslim at Target is a nice example, and further illustrates the problem: culturally, people do not agree about moral ideas. There is no “standard” that can apply to everyone. The Muslim standard doesn’t demonstrate your point:: it proves mine. How do you know the Muslim idea isn’t true? Perhaps Western way of life is completely at odds with the Cosmos. I don’t think so, but you cannot demonstrate otherwise. And the destruction of our own cultural norms (such as the right to life … recall this country began with “we hold these truths to be self-evident, that we are endowed by our creator with …. ” guess what? The next word — I’ll give you a clue — isn’t “choice.”
The Muslim could of course elect to live in a Muslim society and rather notably has chosen not to. However, Americans did not in any significant way “choose” to live in a “pro-choice” society. Abortion was foisted upon the country by a judicial fiat. The votes that would have made abortion legal by legislation did not exist at the time of Roe v Wade. And were abortion rescinded and turned back to the states for legislation, the votes against it would reappear I believe.
Evidently many abortion advocates also believe the same thing which is why they want to keep it a judicial matter through Supreme Court nominations, yes?
Your idea of what is “medically” indicated is simply a bias. That it seems normal to you merely indicates that it’s YOUR bias and not someone else’s.
Democrats like to brag they favor “diversity,” but diversity for Democrats is merely skin color. Underneath the complexion all Democrats are supposed to be alike. When you impose your moral ideas on others, you couldn’t find a more sure way of denying them their true “diversity,” which is to say their individual conscience.
September 20th, 2008 at 6:21 pm
No, the idea of what is “medically” indicated is not a bias, it is the determination of a health care professional. I’m not trying to impose anything on others….if you don’t believe in abortion, don’t have one. It’s that simple. If you don’t believe in abortion and contraception don’t go into the health care profession. Both are health care issues and should be dealt with as such by all health care professionals.
And you are absolutely incorrect about what Americans want concerning Roe v. Wade. Polls show that most Americans, as many as 63% do NOT want to see Roe v. Wade overturned.
What decision a woman comes to concerning abortion is between her and her doctor and really nobody else’s business. If a health care professional cannot separate personal bias and belief from medical treatment they need to find another job.
Not all Republicans are anti-choice, by the way, so your argument makes little sense.
As for the Hippocratic oath…to deny a woman good health care is doing harm.