Bush administration threatens contraceptive availability for low income women
Hillary Clinton has two outspoken press releases out (hat tip to Lauren at Feministe) about the Bush Administration’s latest attack on contraception (yes, that’s right – not abortion, contraception).
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is poised to put in place new barriers to accessing common forms of contraception like birth control pills, emergency contraception and IUDs by labeling them “abortion.” These proposed regulations set to be released next week will allow healthcare providers to refuse to provide contraception to women who need it. We can’t let them get away with this underhanded move to undermine women’s health and that’s why I am sounding the alarm….
The regulations could even invalidate state laws that currently ensure access to contraception for many Americans. In fact, they describe New York and California’s laws requiring prescription drug insurance plans to provide coverage for contraceptives as part of “the problem.” These rules would even interfere with New York State law that ensures survivors of sexual assault and rape receive emergency contraception in hospital emergency rooms….
I’ve occasionally flirted with sympathy for “conscience” objections to birth control by pharmacists, on this blog, in the past, but the sympathy I had in mind was, well, this: First, I half sympathize with the libertarian solution to the problem: pharmacists have the right to refuse to supply birth control, and their employers have the right to fire their asses. Organizations have the right to try to set up no birth control pharmacies and compete with the regular old birth control providing kind. Half sympathize with that solution, because it has its limitations. Given that the government already regulates who can prescribe drugs, it has the right to ask that people to whom it’s granted that privilege actually, you know, dispense drugs. So, accomodating no birth control pharmacies may only work if the government gets to impose restrictions on this such as, say, you can only do this in geographic areas where competing pharmacies are available, you have to prominently display signs that you don’t supply birth control, you can’t suddenly change your mind and pull your customers’ prescriptions out from under them, or whatever (and, I don’t want clinics that my tax money supports to have such restrictions). But, point is – accomodating pharmacists, or pharmacies, with weird religious objections to birth control? Sure, in circumstances where you can set things up so that doing so doesn’t undermine women’s ability to get birth control at all. Using federal funding to cripple clinics’ ability to provide family planning services by trying to prevent their being able to fire employees who won’t do their jobs? Not so much.
The proposed rule defines abortion as “any of the various procedures–including the prescription, dispensing and administration of any drug or the performance of any procedure or any other action–that results in the termination of the life of a human being in utero between conception and natural birth, whether before or after implantation.”
Organizations that do not comply would forfeit financial aid distributed by the Department of Health and Human Services.
If implemented, the regulations could make it more difficult for many to access information about abortion and birth control and obtain supplies and services, said Mary Jane Gallagher, president of the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association in Washington, D.C. The regulation could also undermine state laws ensuring access to birth control, she said. And it would redefine abortion so that it includes certain kinds of birth control methods, setting a dangerous precedent.
Given that emergency contraception, and even the regular old pill, are treated as “abortifacent” by certain people (despite the fact that in both cases the medication generally prevents pregnancy from starting in the first place), rules like these could threaten birth control broadly.
You can sign Hillary Clinton’s petition here.