ProgressNow.org Daily News Digest :: National News

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National News :: Reproductive Choice

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1/5/2009

India Opens Call Center to Help Control Population Growth - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/04/AR2009010401502.html The phone rang at a call center in New Delhi one recent afternoon. When an agent picked up the receiver, a young woman whispered hesitantly. She said that she lived with her large extended family in a remote rural settlement and that nobody knew she was calling. "I told her to be open and have no fear. She paused after every word," recalled Payalkumari, 27, the call center agent, who uses only her first name. "Then she slowly opened up. She was newly married. She said her mother-in-law wanted her to have a child right away, but she was not ready to. She asked, 'Is there some contraception that I can use secretly and nobody else will get to know in the family?' " Payalkumari has taken hundreds of such calls since June, when India's government-sponsored National Population Stabilization Fund opened a call center to provide reliable information about such socially taboo subjects as family planning, contraception and reproductive health -- the first service of its kind in the country.

12/19/2008

Health providers’ ‘conscience’ rule to take effect - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-conscience19-2008dec19,0,6352558.story The Bush administration announced its "conscience protection" rule for the healthcare industry Thursday, giving doctors, hospitals, and even receptionists and volunteers in medical experiments the right to refuse to participate in medical care they find morally objectionable. "This rule protects the right of medical providers to care for their patients in accord with their conscience," said outgoing Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt. The right-to-refuse rule includes abortion and other aspects of healthcare where moral concerns could arise, Leavitt's office said, such as birth control, emergency contraception, in vitro fertilization, stem cell research and assisted suicide. The rule, to be published today in the Federal Register, takes effect the day before President Bush leaves office.

12/11/2008

High court weighs how maternity leaves affect pensions - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2008-12-10-maternity-pensions-supreme-court_N.htm The court heard arguments in the case of four women who lost seniority credit when they took maternity leave before passage of a 1979 law that barred the practice of treating pregnancy leaves differently from other disability leaves. The size of retirement paychecks for thousands of women hangs in the balance as the court considers whether to credit decades-old maternity leaves in calculating pension benefits. Justice David Souter asked why payment of the lower retirement benefits now isn't an act of discrimination.

12/2/2008

Broader medical refusal rule may go far beyond abortion - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-conscience2-2008dec02,0,7013690.story The outgoing Bush administration is planning to announce a broad new "right of conscience" rule permitting medical facilities, doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other healthcare workers to refuse to participate in any procedure they find morally objectionable, including abortion and possibly even artificial insemination and birth control. For more than 30 years, federal law has dictated that doctors and nurses may refuse to perform abortions. The new rule would go further by making clear that healthcare workers also may refuse to provide information or advice to patients who might want an abortion. It also seeks to cover more employees. For example, in addition to a surgeon and a nurse in an operating room, the rule would extend to "an employee whose task it is to clean the instruments," the draft rule said. The "conscience" rule could set the stage for an abortion controversy in the early months of Barack Obama's administration. During the campaign, President-elect Obama sought to find a middle ground on the issue. He said there is a "moral dimension to abortion" that cannot be ignored, but he also promised to protect the rights of women who seek abortion. While the rule could eventually be overturned by the new administration, the process might open a wound that could take months of wrangling to close again.

10/31/2008

Election comes at key point for high court’s stance on abortion - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/judicial/2008-10-30-supremecourt_N.htm John McCain's and Barack Obama's dueling statements on abortion rights have ratcheted up debate over the future of Roe v. Wade at a time when the Supreme Court could be at a crossroads on the 1973 decision that made abortion legal nationwide. Only a bare five-justice majority appears ready to reaffirm the decision. That is a change from national election cycles in the last decade-and-a-half when at least six justices, including now-retired Sandra Day O'Connor, supported abortion rights. A single court appointee could decide whether abortion laws become more restrictive or more permissive and whether Roe v. Wade remains the law. In the last week of the campaign, that point is not lost on advocates in the abortion debate. "This is a historic election," says Charmaine Yoest, president of Americans United for Life. "With the next president having the opportunity to appoint one, two or even more justices," she adds, the election could change the law "on the life issue."

10/27/2008

South Dakota to reconsider vote on abortion ban - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-southdakota27-2008oct27,0,7274715.story The new ballot measure would allow for abortions in the case of rape and incest, exceptions that were not in the 2006 version. The absence of such exceptions is believed to have doomed the earlier version to failure. "They said we'd gone too far, that we had to have exceptions for rape and incest," said Leslee Unruh, an antiabortion activist who has backed both measures. This year's measure permits abortion in cases of rape -- provided the mother identifies the violator, a DNA test proves it is his child and the procedure occurs in the first 20 weeks -- and incest. But opponents contend the initiative does not provide as much leeway as advertised. "They tried to twist it to make it seem like there are exceptions, but there are not exceptions," said Jan Nicolay, a former state legislator who is co-chairwoman of South Dakota for Healthy Families, which opposes the initiative.

More stories in National/Election | Colorado/Election

10/22/2008

Pharmacy in Va. refuses to sell birth control; gets blessed by Catholic Church—chicagotribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-no-contraceptives-pharmacy,0,3856880.story A new drug store at a Virginia strip mall is putting its faith in an unconventional business plan: No candy. No sodas. And no birth control. Divine Mercy Care Pharmacy is among at least seven pharmacies across the nation that are refusing as a matter of faith to sell contraceptives of any kind, even if a person has a prescription. States across the country have been wrestling with the issue of pharmacists who refuse on religious grounds to dispense birth control or morning-after pills, and some have enacted laws requiring drug stores to fill the prescriptions. In Virginia, though, pharmacists can turn away any prescription for any reason. "I am grateful to be able to practice," pharmacy manager Robert Semler said, "where my conscience will never be violated and my faith does not have to be checked at the door each morning."

9/23/2008

Study Finds Major Shift in Abortion Demographics - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/22/AR2008092202831.html The face of women who have abortions has shifted significantly in the past 30 years, with relatively fewer white childless teenagers and more mothers of color in their 20s and 30s opting to terminate their pregnancies, according to a report being released today. In the first comprehensive analysis since 1974 of demographic characteristics of women who have abortions, researchers found that the overall drop in the abortion rate has been marked by a dramatic shift, declining more among white women and teenagers than among black and Hispanic and older women. "There's been a real change in the picture of women who get abortions," said Rachel Jones, a senior research associate at the Guttmacher Institute, a private nonprofit reproductive health research organization considered to be one of the most authoritative sources on abortion trends. "This is the first time anyone has looked at this in a comprehensive way." Jones and her colleagues analyzed annual data collected by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and by periodic surveys that Guttmacher has conducted of abortion providers between 1974 and 2004.

Abortion rate is down, but report cites racial disparity - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-abortion23-2008sep23,0,2950464.story Although the overall U.S. abortion rate is at its lowest level since 1974, the drop has been far more dramatic for whites than for African Americans, who in 2004 had abortions at five times the rate of white women, according to a report released Monday. The abortion rate for Latinas was about three times that of whites. The Guttmacher Institute, a New York-based research group that supports abortion rights but whose statistics are generally respected by antiabortion groups, analyzed 30 years of data since the 1973 Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion. The analysis found that the differences partly reflected varying pregnancy and childbearing patterns. African American women had high rates of unintended pregnancy, 70% compared with 49% across all racial and ethnic groups. About half of unintended pregnancies in the U.S. end in abortion, the report said.

9/3/2008

Case renews abstinence-only debate - chicagotribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-abstinence-03-sep03,0,5761386.story With the pregnancy of Sarah Palin's 17-year-old daughter now becoming an issue in presidential politics, public health experts say that if parents haven't had a heart-to-heart recently with their children about sex, now would be an opportune time. "We do hope that parents take this opportunity ... to sit down around the kitchen table and have a two-way discussion with the teens in their lives and address these issues of sex, love and relationship, pregnancy and family formation," said Bill Albert of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy. Palin's daughter Bristol attended a school where abstinence education is taught, and Palin has expressed her opposition to "explicit" sex education.

More stories in National/Election | Colorado/Election

8/29/2008

Mexican Supreme Court upholds legalized abortion law - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-mexabortion29-2008aug29,0,946461.story In a lopsided ruling, Mexico's Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a year-old law in Mexico City legalizing abortions during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. The court rejected arguments by abortion opponents that the law violated the Mexican Constitution, whose protections they said covered embryos. A majority of justices said overturning the law would block the right of women to end pregnancies in the early weeks.

8/27/2008

Scientists: Save the planet—have fewer kids—chicagotribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-london-population2_goeringaug27,0,4602930.story There are plenty of ways to cut your carbon footprint, whether it's driving less or buying an energy-efficient refrigerator. But the British Medical Journal, in an editorial last month, urged a more controversial one: having fewer children. With 60 million people already living in one of the most densely populated countries in the world, the journal said, British couples should aim to have no more than two children as part of their contribution to worldwide efforts to reduce carbon emissions, stem climate change and ease demands on the world's resources. Limiting family size is "the simplest and biggest contribution anyone can make to leaving a habitable planet for our grandchildren," the editorial's authors said. Family planning as a means to reduce climate change has been little talked about in international climate forums, largely because it is so politically sensitive. China's leaders, however, regularly argue that their country should get emission reduction credits because of their one-child policy, and many environmentalists—and even a growing number of religious and ethics scholars—say the biblical command to "be fruitful and multiply" needs to be balanced against Scripture calling for stewardship of the Earth.

8/22/2008

Protections Set for Antiabortion Health Workers - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/21/AR2008082102818.html The Bush administration yesterday announced plans to implement a controversial regulation designed to protect doctors, nurses and other health-care workers who object to abortion from being forced to deliver services that violate their personal beliefs. The rule empowers federal health officials to pull funding from more than 584,000 hospitals, clinics, health plans, doctors' offices and other entities if they do not accommodate employees who refuse to participate in care they find objectionable on personal, moral or religious grounds. "People should not be forced to say or do things they believe are morally wrong," Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt said. "Health-care workers should not be forced to provide services that violate their own conscience."

8/14/2008

In Africa, Hope for the Stigmatized: Fertility Clinics - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/13/AR2008081303771.html The clinics offer an alternative to superstitious explanations of infertility and the dubious advice of traditional healers, whose cures include having women run naked in circles around a dead sparrow at night. Fertility doctors are also bringing to light an uncomfortable truth about a condition almost always blamed on women: that at least half the time, the problem is with the man. "The number of clients is going up by the day," said Annie Akatabaazi, who helps run a clinic that treats some of the few thousand women here who seek help each year. "Some ask to come at night, so they'll not be seen. Some call whispering. Sometimes they don't want to give you their name. They come saying, 'My husband is going to leave me if I don't have children.' And the men, once they find out, they come every day. If they have an appointment at 9 a.m., they show up at 8." In much of Africa, the stigma of infertility is so severe that it often drives women -- and men -- to suicide. In some rural areas, women who die without children are carried in their coffins through the back door of the church. Women are sometimes branded witches and in other ways forced into isolation in a society that has few places for them.

8/13/2008

Massachusetts high school principal who said girls made pact to get pregnant resigns—chicagotribu

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-pregnancy-pact-principal,0,4490348.story A high school principal who set off a furor after being quoted as saying that teenage girls formed a pact to get pregnant has resigned, weeks after his comments were publicly questioned by the mayor. Time magazine reported in June that Joseph Sullivan said a pact made by a group of teens to get pregnant and raise their babies together was at least partly behind a spike in pregnancies at Gloucester High School. Seventeen girls at the school became pregnant this year — four times the usual number. Sullivan later said he did not recall using the word "pact" but believed many of the pregnancies were intentional. The theory arose amid a debate over whether to dispense contraceptives at a school health clinic without parents' knowledge.

7/31/2008

Workers’ Religious Freedom vs. Patients’ Rights - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/30/AR2008073003238.html A Bush administration proposal aimed at protecting health-care workers who object to abortion, and to birth-control methods they consider tantamount to abortion, has escalated a bitter debate over the balance between religious freedom and patients' rights. The Department of Health and Human Services is reviewing a draft regulation that would deny federal funding to any hospital, clinic, health plan or other entity that does not accommodate employees who want to opt out of participating in care that runs counter to their personal convictions, including providing birth-control pills, IUDs and the Plan B emergency contraceptive. Conservative groups, abortion opponents and some members of Congress are welcoming the initiative as necessary to safeguard doctors, nurses and other health workers who, they say, are increasingly facing discrimination because of their beliefs or are being coerced into delivering services they find repugnant.

7/21/2008

Ruling Gives South Dakota Doctors a Script to Read - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/19/AR2008071901586.html In a victory for antiabortion forces, doctors in South Dakota are now required to tell a woman seeking an abortion that the procedure "will terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique living human being." The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit last week lifted a preliminary injunction that prevented the language from taking effect. A spokesman for Planned Parenthood, which runs the state's only abortion clinic, said doctors will begin reciting the script to patients as early as this week. On another front, South Dakota voters will be asked in a Nov. 4 referendum to consider broad limits on abortion for the second time since 2006. The ballot measure includes exceptions for rape, incest and the woman's health that were not part of the 2006 wording rejected by voters. Antiabortion forces in South Dakota have been trying for years to halt the procedure and to build a winnable challenge to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion nationwide.

7/17/2008

Health proposal rankles Democrats - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2008-07-16-health-proposal_N.htm Democratic lawmakers said Wednesday that the Bush administration is considering a new federal rule that would withhold government funding from health care providers and organizations that refuse to hire workers who won't perform abortions or provide emergency contraception. Federal law already prohibits discriminating against any individual or institution that refuses to perform abortions or provide a referral for one. The Health and Human Services Department is considering requiring health care providers and organizations to certify their compliance with the law. The problem, lawmakers and abortion rights groups said, is that the document defines abortion as including the administration of certain contraceptives; namely, the morning-after pill. If the rule took effect, facilities would be compelled to employ workers unwilling to perform everyday job duties, lawmakers said. "If the administration goes through with this draft proposal, it will launch a dangerous assault on women's health," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

7/15/2008

Abortion Proposal Sets Condition on Aid - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/15/washington/15rule.html?ref=us The Bush administration wants to require all recipients of aid under federal health programs to certify that they will not refuse to hire nurses and other providers who object to abortion and even certain types of birth control. Under the draft of a proposed rule, hospitals, clinics, researchers and medical schools would have to sign “written certifications” as a prerequisite to getting money under any program run by the Department of Health and Human Services. Such certification would also be required of state and local governments, forbidden to discriminate, in areas like grant-making, against hospitals and other institutions that have policies against providing abortion. The proposal, which circulated in the department on Monday, says the new requirement is needed to ensure that federal money does not “support morally coercive or discriminatory practices or policies in violation of federal law.” The administration said Congress had passed a number of laws to ensure that doctors, hospitals and health plans would not be forced to perform abortions.

7/3/2008

Catholic Aid for Abortion Creates Stir in Virginia - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/03/us/03abortion.html?ref=us The Roman Catholic bishop of Richmond, Va., apologized this week after workers from a Catholic organization helped a teenager in its care have an abortion. “I join my sadness to yours at the loss of the life of an unborn child whose teenage mother was in the foster care of Commonwealth Catholic Charities,” said Bishop Francis X. DiLorenzo in a letter published on Monday in The Catholic Virginian. “Obviously, respect for the life of the unborn is a basic tenet of our Catholic faith and morality.” “I express my profound apology for the loss of the life of one of the most vulnerable among us,” the bishop added. The situation involved a 16-year-old Guatemalan, who church officials said already had one child and wanted to end her pregnancy, said Stephen S. Neill, a spokesman for the bishop.

6/30/2008

Number of abortions rising in Middle East, experts say - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-abortion29-2008jun29,0,2600933.story Changing social values and economic realities, along with demographic shifts, are among the reasons, observers in the Arab world say.

6/25/2008

States turning down US abstinence education grants - The Boston Globe

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2008/06/25/states_turning_down_us_abstinence_education_grants/ Skeptical states are shoving aside millions of federal dollars for abstinence education, walking away from the program the Bush administration touts for curbing teen sexual activity. Barely half the states are still in, and two more say they are leaving. About $50 million has been budgeted for this year, and financially strapped states might be expected to want their share. But many have doubts that the program does much, if any, good, and they're frustrated by chronic uncertainty that the program will continue. They also have to chip in state money to receive the federal grants. Governor Chet Culver of Iowa, a Democrat, made his decision to leave the program based on the congressionally mandated curriculum, which teaches "the social, psychological, and health gains of abstaining from sexual activity." Instructors must teach that sexual activity outside marriage is likely to have harmful psychological and physical effects.

So-called pregnancy pact questioned—chicagotribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-pregnancy-pact,0,4156834.story One of the girls who became pregnant at Gloucester High School this year denied Tuesday there was any pact among them to have children, saying instead they decided to help each other make the best of their situations. Lindsey Oliver rebutted the principal's claim that a sharp increase in teen pregnancies -- 17 compared to a typical four -- was in part because several girls planned to get pregnant so they could raise their babies together. "There was definitely no pact," Oliver told "Good Morning America." "There was a group of girls already pregnant that decided they were going to help each other to finish school and raise their kids together. I think it was just a coincidence." Oliver, 17, said she became pregnant by accident and that she and her 20-year-old boyfriend, Andrew Psalidas, a community college student, were using birth control.

6/24/2008

Mass. mayor says no proof girls had pregnancy pact - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-pact24-2008jun24,0,422075.story The city's mayor said today there is no evidence a group of young girls made a pact to get pregnant and raise their babies together, seeking to dispel an explosive theory put forth by the high school principal. "Any planned blood-oath bond to become pregnant -- there is absolutely no evidence of," Mayor Carolyn Kirk said today after a closed-door meeting with city, school and health leaders.

6/17/2008

Grand Juries Become Latest Abortion Battlefield - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/17/us/17jury.html?hp WICHITA, Kan. — Opponents of Dr. George Tiller and his clinic here, one of the nation’s few providers of late-term abortions, have tried many ways to stop him over three decades. They have held protests, lobbied lawmakers and complained persistently to state regulators and prosecutors. There have also been several acts of violence, including one in which Dr. Tiller was shot in both arms.