Reproductive Health

won't you celebrate with me
what i have shaped into
a kind of life? i had no model.

When my coworker posed the question, why are you celebrating women being able to access preventative services without a copay, my answer was sure and simple, “Because women deserve it.”

Not everyone agrees with that statement. If the last months of public debate have shown anything, it’s that there are a wide variety of views on the women’s right to access reproductive healthcare. Some people think it is good public policy and long overdue; others think that it’s a gift or worse, immoral.

I’m personally inclined to side with Justice Ginsberg. In reflecting on Roe she said, “[In] the balance is a woman’s autonomous charge of her full life’s course, her ability to stand in relation to men, society and to stay as an independent, self-sustaining equal citizen.” As I celebrate the ACA and Roe, I celebrate women’s ability to build lives they lives they desire. I’m grateful that reproductive healthcare is one of the tools that expands rather than constrains women’s decisions.

born in babylon
both nonwhite and woman
what did i see to be except myself? Read more »

Roe v. Wade is important to me because no one should be allowed to force a woman to have a baby that she’s not ready to have. Not the man who got her pregnant. Not her family. And certainly not a bunch of politicians. But what’s more important, I think, is that the one out of three women who will have an abortion in her lifetime start to talk about it.

Advocates for Youth and their 1 in 3 Campaign are helping to make that conversation happen. But, still, when I posted on Facebook about my abortion, some people suggested it was TMI (too much information). Well, actually, it wasn’t enough, because context is everything when it comes to reproductive health. Read more »

Think the holidays were just a time for joy, merry making, and generosity? Think again. This holiday season, state politicians continued their attacks on women's reproductive health. Here's a wrap up of from the past 2 weeks.

• Michigan Governor Snyder signed into law unnecessary and burdensome requirements on clinics that provide abortions and a ban on the use of telemedicine for medication abortion, threatening access for women in rural areas.
• In Virginia, Governor McDonnell signed off on burdensome and unnecessary regulations on abortion clinics, which could shut down as many as half of the state's clinics and threaten access for thousands of Virginia women. 
• A state court judge ruled that Texas can exclude Planned Parenthood from its state health program for now, leaving 48,000 women without care.

Importantly, the holidays also brought a few victories for women's reproductive health:

• A Georgia judge temporarily blocked a state law that would criminalize virtually all abortions starting at 20 weeks of pregnancy, with only an extremely narrow exception for the woman's health. 

When you hear the word lobbyist, what comes to mind? Special interests, back-door wheelings and dealings, and other generally shady shenanigans, right? Not always, as it turns out.

Last Tuesday, I had the opportunity to lobby my representatives in Congress as part of Intern Advocacy Day, a joint endeavor between Advocates for Youth, SIECUS, CHANGE, and Choice USA. Over forty interns from various health advocacy organizations around DC gathered near the Capitol to advocate on behalf of two very important pieces of legislation, the Real Education for Healthy Youth Act and the Global Democracy Promotion Act.

As an NWLC intern and as a person who cares about the rights of women more generally, I was eager to urge my congressional delegation to champion these bills. Although they differ wildly in scope, both pieces of legislation are premised on the idea that the best way to promote healthy, empowered decision-making is through the provision of uncensored, scientifically accurate information that is free of ideological biases and paternalistic assumptions.

The Real Education for Healthy Youth Act, for instance, sets forth a policy vision for federally funded comprehensive sex education programs. It outlines standards that sex education curricula must adhere to in order to receive federal funding, directs grant money to comprehensive sex education programs that prioritize information over ideology, and allows for education that is inclusive of lesbian, gay, and bisexual students. Read more »

When you woke up yesterday morning you may have seen that North Dakotans went to the polls Tuesday and defeated Measure 3. But unless you keep a close eye on North Dakota politics, you may not know what the measure is about. Tuesday, North Dakota voters sent a firm message to conservatives who are attempting to wrap limits to women’s health in a shroud of “religious liberty.” North Dakotans demonstrated that their health is not up for debate. The voters made that point by voting 64% to 36% against the measure, according to unofficial election results.

The measure would have added an amendment to the state constitution that “Government may not burden a person’s or religious organization’s religious liberty.”

So what would Measure 3 have meant for North Dakota?

The measure would have opened the door to use religious beliefs as a defense for breaking the law. It would have allowed people to refuse to follow virtually any law—allowing an argument that an individual has a right to abuse a child or wife, an employer to fire an unmarried pregnant woman, a doctor to deny emergency health care, or a health insurance provider to refuse to include certain health care procedures in its coverage, including birth control, all under the guise of a “sincerely held religious belief.” Tuesday’s defeat of the measure means laws that protect against child abuse and domestic violence, create an obligation to provide access to health care, and protect against discrimination in the workplace remain in place. Read more »

This blog post is a part of NWLC’s Mother’s Day 2012 blog series. For all our Mother’s Day posts, please click here.

Don’t think moms talk to daughters about birth control? Check out a video of my daughter and I discussing how difficult it used to be to access birth control.

It's been nearly fifty years since the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Connecticut v Griswold struck down state bans on birth control. Read more »

This week in our roundup, a… unique basketball team, another angle on the benefits of the Affordable Care Act, and how the new CEO of IBM is creating a bit of a stir around Augusta National Golf Club – whether she intends to or not.

If you’ve read some of my previous posts, you might know that I am a bit of a basketball fan. So today I’m excited to share with you the story of a team out in Minnesota. They’re called the Faribault Hotshots, and all the team members are women over 50 years old.

They call it granny basketball.

The story is probably best told in their own words, so be sure to watch the news clip below. The grannies – as they call themselves – modify the game a bit: instead of the standard five-on-five full-court game, they divide the court in the three parts. Players can’t run, nor can they leave their designated area, and they play 8 minute quarters. From time to time, the Hotshots will play Minnesota’s only other granny basketball team, which hails from Wanamingo. And when they do, the gym is full of their friends and family to cheer them on.

One day, in my late 20’s, I was in a car with a friend and she told me about this sexually transmitted virus that almost every woman has been exposed to that causes cancer even if you are using condoms.

There was a lot to take in during that conversation. I never thought about cervical cancer as a teenager. I had never heard of human papillomavirus (HPV). The idea that cancer could be caused by a virus never crossed my mind.

Since then, I have learned a lot more about HPV -- including that use of condoms does reduce the risk of transmission. As I have learned about HPV, I have learned about its connection to cervical cancer. As I learned about cervical cancer, I learned about the importance of getting regular pap smears.

Cervical cancer is the leading cause of cancer death among women in the United States. But I think we are taking tremendous steps to reduce cervical cancer deaths. Read more »

Last May, we told you about a recently signed law that would improve women’s access to family planning services in Maryland, and now the Family Planning Works Act has gone into effect!

The Family Planning Works Act expands the Medicaid family planning service program and is expected to give 33,000 low- and moderate-income women free access to a range of services, including birth control, STI testing, and cancer screenings. Read more »

Welcome to December! As usual, we’ve got another end-of-the-week roundup for you. This week: stories on teen pregnancy rates in the U.S. and sex education, pondering whether or not Apple’s Siri is pro-choice or anti-choice, ways to find a mentor, some new videos in the NWLC library, and this week’s HERvotes blog carnival. 

Over the weekend, The Abortioneers published a blog post pointing out that Siri, the “personal assistant” feature in the new Apple iPhone 4s, doesn’t seem to be able to find information about abortion and abortion clinics. Siri even seems to have difficulty helping people find information about birth control and contraceptive services. What’s even more troubling to pro-choice advocates is that in some cases, Siri actually directs the iPhone user to anti-choice crisis pregnancy centers.

Many have noted that Siri was programmed with a sense of humor. That she’s meant to be a bit sassy. But now some are also asking, is Siri anti-choice? Read more »