Real War On Women Being Led By Pro-Abortion Groups

One thing you can say about progressives is they’ll never let a defeat stand in the way of their agenda.  As I pointed out in my last article, the Democrat party has unofficially been coined as the “right to life party” by Texas Democratic Party Chairman Gilberto Hinojosa.  They proved how in tune they were to saving the lives of women by backing Texas Senator Wendy Davis and her 11 hour filibuster against Senate Bill No. 5.  (SB No. 5).  Even though the bill passed the senate and Governor Rick Perry signed the bill into law; that has not stopped the pro-abortion groups from challenging the constitutionality of this new law.

According to the group Texas Right To Life, Planned Parenthood (PP) and multiple abortion advocates have joined the Center For Reproductive Rights (CRR) and The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) to challenge SB No. 5; also known as House Bill No. 2 (HB No. 2).  It is not shocking that the pro-abortion groups would attempt to file a lawsuit to overturn a law they don’t agree with.  The shocking part is why they are suing.  One would assume that the pro-abortion groups would seek to have late term abortions legalized in the state of Texas but amazingly they didn’t bother to challenge that part of the law.  According to the CRR website, they are suing because they find a problem with the physician requirements and the limitation on the medications used for an abortion.  According to Nancy Northrop, President and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights:

Any one of these restrictions would have a devastating impact across the state of Texas… Together they would be catastrophic, making essential reproductive health care services for many Texans, especially poor and rural women, practically impossible to access. Today’s lawsuit is a united strike back against the hostile politicians who have made clear their willingness to sacrifice the constitutional rights, health, and even lives of Texas women in support of their extremist ideological agenda.

Cecile Richards, President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America had this to say about the lawsuit:

We’re in court today to stop a terrible situation for women in Texas from getting even worse… Politicians are interfering with the personal medical decisions of women who already have the least access to birth control and preventive health care. If this law goes into effect, there is no doubt it will end access to safe and legal abortion for many women, leaving some to resort to desperate and dangerous measures. We won’t let that happen.

Finally Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU had this to say:

This law is part of a coordinated national strategy to shut down women’s health centers and outlaw abortion all across the country…In Texas and across the nation, people are standing up to tell politicians to stop interfering in a woman’s private decisions. We are part of this lawsuit because Americans know that these deeply personal decisions must be made by a woman, her family, and her doctor, not by a politician sitting in the capitol.

So what is in this law that has these organizations so concerned that they felt the need to file a lawsuit?  Well, according to HB. No. 2 Section 171.0031, it states:

• That a physician performing an abortion must on the date of the abortion have active admitting privileges at a hospital that is located no further than 30 miles from the location at which the abortion is performed and provide OB/GYN health care services. 
• This physician must provide the pregnant woman with a telephone number by which she can reach the physician, the physician’s office, or other healthcare personnel that have access to her records 24 hours a day.  That way she is able to call at any time if there are complications that may arise from the abortion or if she has any questions regarding the procedure.
• The woman must be provided with the name and telephone number of the nearest hospital to the woman’s home in case an emergency arises so she can be treated.

The other part of the lawsuit pertains to Section 171.063. It states:

• A person may not knowingly give, sell, dispense, administer, provide, or prescribe an abortion-inducing drug to a pregnant woman unless the person is a physician.
• The drug must be a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved drug.
• The physician must follow the clinical management guidelines defined by the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologist Practice Bulletin when administering the dosage of the abortion drug.
• The doctor must give the pregnant woman an examination and keep medical records of the gestation age and the intrauterine location of the pregnancy prior to administering the abortion drug.
• The physician must give the woman a copy of the abortion drug label as well as a phone number for whom to call if she has any complications from the abortion.
• The physician must schedule a follow up appointment for the woman after the abortion and it must be within 14 of the abortion.
• The physician must report any adverse reactions to the abortion drugs to the FDA through the MedWatch Reporting System no later than three days after the abortion was performed.

In other words, the State of Texas has increased the standard of care for abortion clinics and the pro-abortion activists don’t like it one bit.  This improvement in care has caused such an uproar that the passage of this bill has been cited as the reason why four abortion clinics had to close.  The pro-abortion groups are using these closures as proof that Texas doesn’t care about women’s health.  They cite examples of how women have to drive three hours to get health care or contraception now that these clinics are closed.  I’ve always been confused by the notion that women can’t receive care anywhere else. I’ve never once set foot into an abortion clinic and I as well as millions of women across this country am able to find a physician to take care of our women’s health.  The only thing that said physician may not do is perform an abortion.

The disturbing part about all of this is the pro-abortion groups are spending a lot of time, energy, and money to sue the State of Texas and yet no one has even bothered to ask a woman should settle for a lower standard of care?  After all, this is the new “right to life party” that truly cares for women’s health.  I would think that if they truly cared about women they would demand that these clinics adopt the new health standards to prevent another Kermit Gosnell or Douglas Karpin.  Instead they’d rather fight for these types of doctors and go as far as turn them into sympathetic people via an upcoming documentary that showcases one of the doctors that invites women to hold their aborted children and take pictures.  These are not the actions of a group of people who care about women.  If they did they would be embracing the new standards instead of standing in the way of patient care.