Idaho Governor Signs Parental Consent Law

This week Idaho Governor Butch Otter signed a bill into law requiring parental consent before minors in the state can obtain abortion care. The law is effective immediately and does allow a minor the option to seek judicial bypass in cases of rape, incest, a medical emergency, or if a minor is mature enough to decide on her own. Idaho’s previous parental consent laws have been ruled unconstitutional in court challenges.

>Learn more about the dangers of state parental involvement legislation.

South Carolina House Passes Measure to Mandate Ultrasounds

The South Carolina House passed a measure last week that would require women seeking abortion care to view an ultrasound image of the fetus prior to the procedure. While other states give women the option to have an ultrasound and view the image, South Carolina would be the first state to mandate the practice. The measure passed in the House by a 91-23 vote, and advanced to the Senate last week.

The National Abortion Federation Condemns Mississippi Abortion Ban

Here is the press release we issued Friday:

Washington, DC—Vicki Saporta, President and CEO of the National Abortion Federation, released the following statement today condemning Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour’s decision to sign an abortion ban into law. The bill would ban almost all abortions in the state if the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade.

This law is a near-total ban on abortion. It would deny Mississippi women necessary reproductive health care. Under this law doctors would also face imprisonment for providing women with safe abortion care. Politicians should not endanger the lives and health of women to advance their own political agendas.

For more than 30 years, Roe v. Wade has protected the lives and health of American women. Citizens in Mississippi will not tolerate a return to the days of back-alley abortions when women had to sacrifice their lives and health to end an unwanted pregnancy.

Polish Woman Awarded Damages After Abortion Refusal

The European Court of Human Rights has awarded a Polish woman more than $30,000 in damages after she was refused an abortion despite warnings from her doctor that continuing the pregnancy could cause her to go blind. Alicja Tysiac suffers from severe myopia, and when she became pregnant for the third time in 2000 she consulted three ophthalmologists who each concluded her eyesight would be damaged further if she carried the pregnancy to term. However, despite Tysiac’s requests, all three doctors refused to issue a certificate for the pregnancy to be terminated on medical grounds, according to the court.

After giving birth Tysiac suffered a retinal hemorrhage which caused her vision to deteriorate significantly and she has been declared disabled by a panel of doctors. Poland currently has one of the strictest abortion bans in Europe, with the procedure only permitted in cases of rape or incest, fetal abnormality, or danger to the life or health of the woman. The court ruled that Poland has no effective legal framework for pregnant women to assert their right to abortion on medical grounds.

Georgia House Passes Ultrasound Bill

Monday the Georgia House of Representatives approved a bill, which would require doctors to offer women seeking abortion care the option to view an ultrasound image of the fetus prior to the procedure. The measure would also require women to certify in writing that they were given the opportunity to view the ultrasound image, and document whether they opted to do so. During debate in the House, legislators discussed even more intrusive measures, including mandating an ultrasound for all women or requiring a woman to have 15 minutes of reflection time before an abortion. While Georgia lawmakers were able to compromise on the language, this measure still interferes with the doctor-patient relationship. The bill heads to the Senate where a more restrictive ultrasound measure was passed last year.

Mexico City May Legalize First-Trimester Abortions

Mexico City legislators are debating a bill that would legalize abortion during the first trimester of pregnancy. Abortion is currently permitted only in cases of rape or life endangerment in this predominantly Roman Catholic city. Bill supporters say these restrictions force women to seek abortions outside the law. Mexican women often travel to the U.S. to obtain abortion care, but many low-income women who cannot afford this option resort to dangerous back-alley or self-induced procedures. This bill would be the first of its kind in Mexico City, and could be approved within the coming months.

Attend the Women's Equality Summit!

Convened by the National Council of Women’s Organizations (NCWO) and the Younger Women’s Task Force, the Women's Equality Summit is a two-day conference that will bring together 500 women leaders, activists and students to kick-off a legislative agenda for the 110th Congress.

Hundreds of women leaders and our allies will gather in the nation's capital for two days of briefings, training sessions and face-to-face meetings with Members of Congress and national women leaders. The Summit is a project of the National Council of Women's Organizations (NCWO), the largest coalition of women's groups in the country, and the Younger Women's Task Force (YWTF), the grassroots movement that engages women in their 20's and 30's to act on the issues that matter most to them.

Where? March 26: National Education Association, 1201 16th Street, NW, Washington, DC, 20036 March 27: Capitol Hill

Who? You, your colleagues, co-workers, leaders, students, grassroots activists, scholars--anyone who cares about women's equality!

> Learn more about this event

Crisis Pregnancy Centers in the News

Sunday’s Palm Beach Post featured a front-page article about Crisis Pregnancy Centers (CPCs). The article discussed the misleading and inaccurate information CPCs tell women including that there is a link between abortion and increased risk for developing breast cancer. More than 100 of the world’s leading experts on pregnancy and breast cancer have concluded that having an abortion does not increase a woman’s subsequent risk of developing breast cancer.

The article also included the experience of a patient who mistakenly visited a CPC in Virginia and has decided to publicly share her story about being harassed and mislead.

If you have experience with a deceptive CPC, we would be interested in hearing your story.

>View NAF’s report, Crisis Pregnancy Centers: An Affront to Choice.
>Share your story about your experience with a CPC.

Portugal Parliament Votes to Legalize Abortion

Last night Portugal’s parliament voted to legalize abortion up until the 10th week of pregnancy, just weeks after a popular referendum showed that 59.3 percent of voters were in favor of legalizing abortion. The referendum failed due to low voter turnout, but Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates pledged to honor the wishes of the voters and legalize abortion in Portugal. The old abortion law was one of the most rigid abortion laws in Europe, with the procedure banned except in cases of rape, fetal malformation, or if a woman's life or health was at risk.

Ricardo Rodrigues, a senior legislator called parliament’s vote, “a turning point in Portugal's history,” and said that he hoped decriminalizing abortion will put an end to dangerous backstreet abortions. Each year over 20,000 Portuguese women put their lives at risk through dangerous self-induced or back-alley abortions, and thousands more terminate unwanted pregnancies in underground private clinics or travel to other countries with less restrictive abortion laws.

New Hampshire House Votes to Repeal Parental Notification Law

Yesterday morning the New Hampshire House of Representatives voted to repeal the state’s parental notification law by a 226-130 vote. The mandate, which would have required doctors to notify parents at least 48 hours before a minor obtains an abortion, passed in 2003 by six votes in the state House and by one vote in the state Senate, but never took effect due to legal challenges reaching all the way to the Supreme Court in Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of Northern New England.

In January 2006 the Court issued its ruling in Ayotte, and unanimously recognized and upheld its own precedent that abortion laws must protect women's health and well-being. The Supreme Court sent the case back to the lower court to determine if the state legislature would have passed the law with a health exception. If not, the Court agreed that the law should be struck down. Supporters of the parental notification law introduced two amendments intended to salvage the law by adding an exception to protect the mother’s health, but both were defeated.

Celebrating the Career of Frances Kissling

On Friday evening I attended a retirement reception to celebrate Frances Kissling and her distinguished career in the reproductive rights movement. In addition to serving as the director of one of the nation’s first legal abortion clinics in New York, Frances helped found the National Abortion Federation in 1977. For the last 25 years, she has served as the President of Catholics for a Free Choice, and has been a valued colleague and friend.

>Learn more about Frances Kissling.
>Learn about the history of NAF.

Take Action: Show Your Appreciation for Abortion Providers

March 10 is the National Day of Appreciation for Abortion Providers. Show your support for the health care professionals who dedicate their lives to providing women with safe abortion care, by signing NAF’s petition to let them know how much you appreciate their commitment to reproductive freedom.