Post Roe Abortion Problems

[poplove]

I saw this organization mentioned on the tweeter. They are volunteers who help people who need care: https://www.elevatedaccess.org/

[jez]

Reddit also has a sub called the "Auntie Network" that helps women who need to obtain care. https://www.reddit.com/r/auntienetwork/.

[sugar magnolia]

My highly-NOT-opinionated husband came in here the other day after we'd been discussing signing up for the St Jude's monthly donation thing and asked if we could support Planned Parenthood too/instead. My jaw hit the floor. He has never shown any specific interest in a charity and just goes along with whatever I suggest. He seems bemused at best when I go on a political or social issues walk or rally and has never shown the slightest inclination to participate. Of course my response was a huge "hell yes."

[much ado]

The Republicans completely underestimated how overturning Roe v. Wade would motivate people to get up off their asses and oppose them. They still do not seem to understand. To them, it's one of the great things Trump accomplished. It will be their downfall.

[sugar magnolia]

My brother used to stand in the street at the local abortion clinic waving a sign that said "honk if you think they're assholes" with an arrow pointing at the anti-abortion protesters. This was in front of the Pink House, of Dobbs fame. I was so proud of him.

[much ado]

Very cool!

[AndyinPA]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2 ... h-circuit/

A federal appeals court on Tuesday ruled that Texas hospitals and doctors are not obligated to perform abortions under a longstanding national emergency-care law, dealing a blow to the White House's strategy to ensure access to the procedure after the Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion in 2022.

The federal law “does not mandate any specific type of medical treatment, let alone abortion,” the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit concluded, faulting the Biden administration’s interpretation of the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, or EMTALA. The law “does not govern the practice of medicine,” the court added.

The three-judge panel also faulted the Biden administration’s process of issuing its emergency-care guidance, saying that federal officials did not go through the proper rulemaking process when the administration instructed health-care providers that they were protected by EMTALA if they believed an abortion to be medically necessary. The panel further said that the federal emergency-care law did not “directly conflict” with a near-total abortion ban in effect in Texas, which was authored by the state’s Republican legislators and includes exceptions for medical emergencies.

The White House and federal health officials have invoked EMTALA — the 1986 law that requires hospitals and physicians to treat emergency medical conditions or risk fines, civil lawsuits and being blacklisted from federal health programs — in the wake of the Supreme Court’s June 2022 decision that overturned the national right to abortion and led to about two dozen state bans on the procedure. The Biden administration is now engaged in several lawsuits that are expected to set precedent over whether the emergency-care law applies to abortion access, including the Texas case.

[raison de arizona]

Republican Officials Openly Insult Women Nearly Killed by Abortion Bans
Red states would rather let a patient die than let her terminate a dangerous pregnancy. And they’re barely pretending otherwise.

A recent filing by the office of Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan T. Skrmetti, a Republican, captures the dynamic all too well. Skrmetti has been fighting a lawsuit filed by a group of Tennessee women denied emergency abortions under the ultranarrow medical exception to that state’s ban. The women plaintiffs suffered an appalling range of trauma, including sepsis and hemorrhaging, because they could not terminate their pregnancies. The attorney general’s response to their complaint is a scathing, shockingly personal broadside against the victims of the ban. He accused them of attempting to draw “lines about which unborn lives are worth protecting” by imposing a medical exception “of their own liking.” He mocked them for asserting that ostensibly minor conditions like “sickle cell disease” might justify an abortion. And he insisted that the lead plaintiff, Nicole Blackmon, lacks standing, because she underwent sterilization after the state forced her to carry a nonviable pregnancy and deliver a stillborn baby. The attorney general viciously suggested that, if Blackmon really wanted to fight Tennessee’s ban, she could have tried for another doomed pregnancy.

Perhaps Skrmetti deserves half credit for candor, because he did not even pretend to treat these plaintiffs like compelling moral human beings. Instead, he wrote that Tennessee may allow different standards of care for pregnant and nonpregnant women. A pregnant woman, the attorney general averred, may be refused a treatment if it “has the potential to harm unborn lives—an issue not implicated” when treating nonpregnant women. “No equal-protection rule,” he concluded, “bars lawmakers from acting on that difference to protect unborn babies.” In other words, once a woman is pregnant, she becomes a vessel for “unborn babies,” giving the state authority to cut off her access to urgently necessary health care. Since nonpregnant women don’t immediately suffer the consequences of abortion bans, those bans don’t discriminate on the basis of sex.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and his staff have evinced similar hostility toward plaintiffs in the Lone Star State who brought a nearly identical suit. The lead plaintiff in that case, Amanda Zurawski, was denied an abortion for three agonizing days after her water broke in the second trimester, leading her to develop sepsis; she nearly died in the ICU, and may never be able to get pregnant again. Paxton’s response? Because she might now be infertile—as a direct result of Texas law— Zurawski lacks standing to sue. When the case went to trial, Texas’ lawyers asked profoundly insulting questions of the plaintiffs. “Did Attorney General Ken Paxton tell you you couldn’t get an abortion?” they pressed each woman after pressing them for invasive details about their failed pregnancies. One plaintiff vomited on the stand after recounting her horror story.

These arguments are echoed by red-state attorneys general around the country, like Idaho’s Raúl Labrador, who proclaimed that women forced to carry dangerous, nonviable pregnancies merely “disagree with the legitimate policy choices made by the Idaho legislature.” (Should an Idaho resident suffering excruciating pain from a failing pregnancy drive to the statehouse rather than the emergency room? Labrador seems to think so.) Critically, these lawyers and politicians and activists are gaslighting their real victims. During a hearing over Zurawski’s case at the Texas Supreme Court, Beth Klusmann of the Texas attorney general’s office shifted the blame onto doctors: “If a woman is bleeding,” Klusmann said, “if she has amniotic fluid running down her legs—then the problem is not with the law. It is with the doctors.”

Months later, this exact scenario occurred: Kate Cox was bleeding and leaking amniotic fluid. She asked for an abortion. Her doctor could not provide one under Texas law without risking a 99-year prison sentence. That physician sued for permission to obtain one. Paxton immediately fought her lawsuit tooth and nail, accusing Cox of being a shameless liar and threatening to prosecute any health care provider who assisted her in terminating the pregnancy. And he prevailed, securing a Texas Supreme Court decision blocking Cox’s abortion. (She traveled out of state to get it.)

Cox’s problem was not with the doctors. It was with the law. Specifically, it was with a set of judges, state officials, and lawyers who cast her as a selfish liar and a bad mother for valuing her life above that of a nonviable fetus. Nothing Cox, nor Zurawski, nor the Tennessee plaintiffs could have alleged or argued would have saved them from being derided, insulted, and denied treatment for the crimes of failing to put their unborn fetuses before their own lives.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/202 ... eaths.html

[AndyinPA]

[Slim Cognito]

My story doesn’t compare to what women are suffering now but I thought I should tell it just to give another example of lawmakers not giving a crap about a woman’s health when a pregnancy goes sideways.

I am one of those bazillion women who would’ve died in childbirth, my first baby, had I lived a hundred or more years ago. There is a condition called preeclampsia, pretty common actually, and I developed it. At the time of my pregnancy, the only way to treat preeclampsia was terminate the pregnancy. my blood pressure had skyrocketed, I was in danger of having a stroke. FYI, I always had and still to this day in my late 60s, have excellent blood pressure, ~120/60.

But back to 1978. I was in agony, although not labor, but I fortunately, was far enough along that inducing labor resulted in a viable infant just short of eight months. He was small, but not so small he needed NICU. he had a lot of issues his first year of life. He recently celebrated his healthy 44th birthday.

And I often wonder about other women who develop preeclampsia as I did, but who are not far enough along to be carrying a viable fetus. Had that been my case, Would Texas, or any of these other misogynistic legislative moronic states insisted I could not be treated until I was literally stroking out? Or worse?

Now, some of you with daughters and granddaughters may have experiences like that with their pregnancies, and it certainly possible that, 44 years later, medical science has advanced in treatments of preeclampsia that do not require termination. In my day, any drugs that would have treated the preeclampsia also would have harmed the fetus. I’d be interested in hearing other stories.

[Volkonski]

Other treatments are available these days.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-con ... c-20355751

[AndyinPA]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/rep-monic ... er-website

In 2020, Monica De La Cruz was, like most Republican candidates for office, a vocal opponent of abortion rights. Campaigning for a swing U.S. House seat in south Texas that year, De La Cruz proclaimed her belief that human life begins at conception. On her campaign website’s issues page, “Pro-Life” was listed at the top.

“As your Congresswoman I promise to fight for each and every soul and to always support the sanctity of life,” she wrote.

Now, four years later, De La Cruz is an incumbent congresswoman running to keep her seat in a competitive race. But on her campaign website, you won’t find her absolutist anti-abortion position. In fact, you won’t find any mention of abortion anywhere on De La Cruz’s website at all.

[raison de arizona]

Wow. Gavin Newsom is now running this commercial in Tennessee.

Tennessee Republicans have banned abortion even for rape victims and they are now trying to punish young women that travel to receive care.

[keith]

Newsom is being asked constantly if he ready to step in for Biden. Of course he correctly says no.

I can't help but wonder though if he isn't somehow encouraging the question, not because he wants to replace Biden in 2024, but because its a long game for 2028 and he wants a bit of the national mind share.

Harris has a natural head start, Buttegeig (sp) hasn't really started yet (who else is there? Maybe the soon to be Senator from CA?), and Newsome wants to make sure he's on the short list.

[AndyinPA]

I think Josh Shapiro, current gov of PA, has a chance at some point in the future.

[raison de arizona]

Heartbreaking, just heartbreaking.

You need to listen to Allie Phillips’ story. It is heartbreaking.

Stories like this are happening because Republicans overturned Roe.

[Volkonski]

France to enshrine abortion in its constitution in response to rollback of rights in U.S.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/france-ab ... -1.7128501

France's Senate adopted a bill on Wednesday to enshrine the right to an abortion in the Constitution, clearing a key hurdle for legislation promised by President Emmanuel Macron in response to a rollback of abortion rights in the United States.

Wednesday's vote came after the lower house, the National Assembly, overwhelmingly approved the proposal in January. The measure now goes before a joint session of Parliament for its expected approval by a three-fifths majority next week.

Macron said after the vote that his government is committed to "making women's right to have an abortion irreversible by enshrining it in the constitution." He said on X, formerly Twitter, that he would convene a joint session of Parliament for a final vote on Monday.

Macron's government wants Article 34 of the constitution amended to specify that "the law determines the conditions by which is exercised the freedom of women to have recourse to an abortion, which is guaranteed."

[RTH10260]

Amazing Mom SLAMS John Kennedy's AWFUL Testimony

TYT Investigates
29 Feb 2024

Amazing mom and activist Allie Phillips slams John Kennedy's fearmongering, insensitive testimony on abortion in epic fashion. John Kennedy gets ripped apart for his disgusting line of questioning at a hearing on women's reproductive rights. Phillips shares her personal story about making the difficult decision to have an abortion, and she bashes Kennedy for his lack of understanding and consideration.

[raison de arizona]

Dark times.

[Uninformed]

Absolutely disgraceful.

[AndyinPA]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... n-children

More than half of all states have at least some measure on the books that defines a fetus or embryo as a person, or that could be honed into a legal spear to advance fetal personhood, according to an analysis by the pro-abortion rights group Pregnancy Justice. In Tennessee, for example, dozens of women have been charged under the state’s fetal assault law, often for suspected drug use.

Kentucky is among at least six states where lawmakers have proposed measures similar to a Georgia law that allows child support to be sought back to conception. Georgia also allows prospective parents to claim an income tax deduction for dependent children before birth; Utah enacted a pregnancy tax break last year; and variations of those measures are before lawmakers in at least a handful of other states. In the wake of the outcry over Alabama, however, Florida lawmakers paused their push for a fetal personhood bill.

The Kentucky bill underwent a major revision before winning senate passage. The original version would have allowed a child support action at any time following conception, but the measure was amended to have such an action apply only retroactively after the birth within the time limit.

Despite the change, abortion-rights supporters will watch closely for any attempt by anti-abortion lawmakers to reshape the bill in a way that “sets the stage for personhood” for a fetus, said Tamarra Wieder, the Kentucky state director for Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates. The measure still needs to clear a house committee and the full house. Any house change would send the bill back to the senate.

[Dr. Ken]

[RTH10260]

States push ‘fetal personhood’ bills despite outrage at Alabama IVF ruling
Lawmakers in more than a dozen states have considered efforts to give legal rights and protections to embryos and fetuses

Carter Sherman
Wed 20 Mar 2024 11.00 CET

Lawmakers in more than a dozen states have considered efforts to endow embryos or fetuses with legal rights and protections since the start of the year, and at least three states have advanced such “fetal personhood” legislation since February, when an Alabama supreme court decision ruling that frozen embryos are “extrauterine children” unleashed national outrage.

The Alabama state legislature responded to the repercussions of that ruling – which led several of the state’s in vitro fertilization (IVF) providers to halt their work – by passing a bill to protect providers’ ability to offer that treatment. Yet, just hours after the legislature passed those protections, Republicans in the Iowa statehouse passed a fetal personhood bill that amends state law to criminalize causing the “death of an unborn person”.

An “unborn person”, according to the Iowa bill, is “an individual organism of the species homo sapiens from fertilization to live birth”. Such a definition would include frozen embryos, which are eggs that have been fertilized by sperm. If passed by the Republicans who control the Iowa state senate, the bill could endanger IVF access in the state. But because the language of the bill is so broad, prosecutors may also try to apply it to a wide range of circumstances. Causing the “death of an unborn person” intentionally through acts like murder, assault or sexual abuse would be a Class A felony, punishable by a life sentence. Doing so unintentionally would be a Class B felony. The bill even specifies that unintentionally causing “the death of an unborn person while drag racing” would be a Class D felony.

State legislators have also recently pushed fetal personhood language in other, less conspicuous areas of law. In early March, the Kentucky state senate passed a bill to establish the right to demand child support for fetuses; that bill has passed to the statehouse, which, like the senate, is dominated by a Republican supermajority.

That same week, the Republican-controlled Utah state legislature sent the governor there a bill that would allow fetuses to seek legal restitution if the fetus’s parent has been killed or injured.

We have to grapple with the implications, because when it’s in law in one area, we see the creep into other areas of law
Dana Sussman, Pregnancy Justice
“Fetal personhood exists in some form or fashion in pretty much every state,” said Dana Sussman, deputy executive director of Pregnancy Justice, an advocacy organization supporting people who face criminalization over their pregnancies. She warned of the sweeping effects of such language even in what seem like narrow contexts. “We have to grapple with the implications, because when it’s in law in one area … we see the creep into other areas of law. Judges will say: ‘Well, it’s a person in this context. So why isn’t it a person in that context?’”

As of 2022, at least 11 states – including Alabama – have what Pregnancy Justice identified as “extremely broad personhood language that could be read to affect all state laws, civil and criminal”, according to a brief by the organization. “Those are the ones that really have the power in their language itself to increase criminalization of pregnant people, to threaten IVF, to threaten forms of contraception and obviously to ban abortion,” Sussman said.



https://www.theguardian.com/society/202 ... nhood-bill

[Resume18]

Gilead, again.

[Rolodex]

Are they going to charge God with murder when a person has a miscarriage? What if you don't know if it's a miscarriage or just a heavy period - just charge all bleeding women with murder?