roe v. wade

(All of this is quoted from an article in Glamour Magazine for February 2007. I think that all women should read it and begin to stand up for these proposed bills.

Please read it. It is the part of the issue that really means a lot to me and it is not a cry for or against abortion. I promise, just read it. It's worth it. And the bold stuff is my emphasis.)



Abortion is a fundamental right. Abortion is morally wrong. Abortion is...
We interrupt the decades-long battle over reproductive rights with this news flash: Abortion is preventable. Reduce the sky-high number of unplanned pregnancies in the United States, and abortions will decrease too. Isn't it time?

"People aren't going to change their opinions about abortion, but most agree that women shouldn't have to make that decision in the first place," says Sarah Brown, director of the nonpartisan National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. Adds pro-life Representative Tim Ryan (D-Ohio), "We need to transcend this bitter debate and reduce the need for abortion." It may sound like a Nobel Prize-winning feat, but it is doable - and it needs to happen.

A whopping 49 percent of all pregnancies in the United States are unintended - that's 3.1 million a year, topping most industrialized nations. Almost half of those accidental pregnancies end in abortion. Among our poorest women, unplanned pregnancies have risen almost 30 percent in the past decade, and abortions are up for them too.

Sad but true: The world's lone superpower can't get a grip on family planning. Our mothers and grandmothers fought hard for women's right to control their fertility - why is it still out of reach for so many? Well, first off, there's the gutting of family planning programs. Half of all women seeking birth control need publicly funded services, but 22 states have cut such programs in recent years. Nurse-practitioner Cathy Hansell of the Castleton, Indiana, Planned Parenthood clinic says, "It's sad, but many patients come in for pregnancy tests after they ran out of birth control and couldn't afford more." Compounding the problem, at press time the Bush administration had appointed a new chief of family planning services with an anti-contraception track record.

Most Americans do agree - as polls show - that contraception should be readily available and that sex education in schools should be frank and clear. Two proposals in Congress could make that happen. Pro-life Rep. Ryan joined pro-choice Representative Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) to create a bill that would require birth control coverage for women who can't afford it and establish grants for comprehensive sex ed. In the Senate, a similar bill from pro-choice Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and pro-life Senator Harry Reid (D-Nev.) could prevent an estimated 500,000 unplanned pregnancies and nearly 200,000 abortions per year.

Hopefully these measures will get bipartisan support. Pro-choice Senator Olympia Snowe (R-Me.), for one, plans to work with her colleagues on this issue. "In order to reduce unwanted pregnancies, we must teach abstinence, responsible behavior and the use of contraception," she tells Glamour. "It just makes sense."

Not to everyone, though: When NARAL Pro-Choice America ran ads last year in conservative publications inviting abortion rights opponents to collaborate on a program to reduce unplanned pregnancies, "the silence was deafening," says NARAL president Nancy Keenan.

That's good reason for you to speak up and let your elected officials know that you're behind the cause. The longer we let this dire situation go on, the more women will have to make painful decisions about abortions. Women out there need help now - let's give it to them.