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Planned Parenthood Action Center Blog

Just Say No

Blog by: AshleyJudd on 11/21/2008

Tags: Reproductive Rights , Birth Control , Women's Rights , Health , Abortion

I’ve read all about the proposed HHS regulation, and I find it gruesome and disturbing.

This regulation could significantly limit patients' access to both health care services and important information about their health care options. It is unnecessary and will disrupt an existing legal framework that has already established a balance between an employee's right to exercise his or her religious beliefs and an employer’s ability to provide patients with access to health care.

If implemented, the proposed regulation would significantly expand the ability of health care providers to withhold treatment, counseling, or medical information based on religious and moral beliefs — without any regard for the needs of patients. As a result of this regulation, patients could be cut off from a broad spectrum of health care services, including contraceptive care, HIV/AIDS care, fertility care, and mental health services.

At a time when millions of Americans are struggling to afford basic needs, I find it especially troubling that HHS is proposing a regulation that could hamstring our nation's ability to expand and protect access to health care.

I urge you to help put a halt to the HHS rule.  Tell the Bush Administration “No” to this kind of bad medicine.

Actor Ashley Judd is a member of the Planned Parenthood Board of Advocates.

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Our partners in Congress are sending a loud and clear message to the White House — no more bad medicine!

Hot on the heels of the Protecting Patients and Health Care Act put forward by Senators Clinton and Murray, U.S. Reps. Diana DeGette and Louise Slaughter introduced legislation in the House that also seeks to derail the Bush Administration’s latest attack on women’s health.

Rep. Slaughter calls the ill-conceived proposed HHS rule, which according to reports HHS is still planning to finalize, a “parting gift” from the Bush Administration. I think it’s fair to say it’s a gift we plan to return, unopened.

The voices of opposition are growing stronger by the minute. Make your voice heard as well. Tell President Bush — no more politics in the exam room.

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Senators Stand Up

Blog by: LauraLamb on 11/20/2008

Tags: Reproductive Rights , Birth Control , Women's Rights , Health , Abortion

Kudos to Senators Hillary Clinton and Patty Murray. 

Someone in Congress had to take a stand against the HHS rule that would jeopardize our access to safe, accurate, and reliable reproductive health care and information — and Senators Clinton and Murray are doing just that. The two senators have proposed legislation that would block the sweeping changes of Bush's ill-conceived, anticipated 11th-hour regulation.

The proposed HHS rule is just another attempt to force politics into the exam room — and with eight years of the Bush administration nearly behind us, we've had quite enough of that. Planned Parenthood will not sit by and let that happen.  We — with tens of thousands of our supporters behind us — have written letters, lobbied elected officials, and made the case for doing away with this kind of bad medicine.

So, a round of applause for Senators Clinton and Murray.  How refreshing to see elected officials doing what they are meant to do — stand up for everyday citizens and the things we value most, like protecting women's health.

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Today The New York Times published an in-depth article closely examining the overwhelming opposition to a proposed Department of Health and Human Services regulation that would limit the rights of patients to receive complete and accurate health information.

If Bush gets his way, this dangerous policy will likely be issued this week.

The article points out the strong opposition of members of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and of the commission’s counsel.  They wrote to HHS complaining   that court cases decided under the Civil Rights Act have carefully addressed the religious rights of employees, and the proposed HHS rule “would throw this entire body of law into question.” 

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission isn’t the only group crying foul. State governors and attorneys generals across the country are objecting to the rule, which threatens women’s health.

Now it’s your turn. Tell President Bush to keep his politics out of your exam room.

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Just when you thought you could relax …

With all expectant eyes on the coming Obama administration, it’s easy to forget that George W. Bush is still in the White House for some 60-odd days. And, in these waning days, President Bush seems eager to leave his mark — any which way he can.

One of those ways is an unacceptable and dangerous Department of Health and Human Services rule that would limit the rights of patients to receive complete and accurate health information and services. Even worse, this rule would open the door to individual health care providers being able to redefine abortion to include many forms of birth control. Women’s ability to manage their own health care is at risk of being compromised by politics and ideology.

Earlier this fall, 200,000 people including — 90,000 of you — wrote to Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt, decrying the Bush administration's attack on women’s health care and asking for the rule to be withdrawn. And there’s been a groundswell of support against this rule — we’ve worked with hundreds of elected officials, including more than 150 members of Congress and a coalition of state attorneys general and governors. But it’s become increasingly clear that the implementation of this rule is on the horizon.

Now it's time to take this to the White House. Email President Bush and tell him that the exam room is no place to play politics.

Stay tuned. We'll have more information as it becomes available.

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This morning, I attended the taping of a television show where Dr. Joseph Karanja, a prominent member of the Reproductive Health and Rights Alliance (RHRA), discussed his support for abortion law reform in Kenya.

Dr. Karanja spoke eloquently about how, as a doctor, he has witnessed too many poor women suffering from the devastating effects of unsafe and dangerous abortions. Abortion is legal in Kenya to save a woman’s life, but there are few providers who offer services and even fewer places where women can access them. He made a plea that the Kenyan abortion law be clarified so that Kenyan women could legally obtain safe abortions.

Also interviewed was Dr. Kagia, an ob/gyn, who discussed how she supports access to birth control, but opposes abortion under any circumstances — even in cases of rape or incest.

In response, one young woman behind me, a student from the University of Nairobi, raised her hand and said sharply, "With all due respect, Dr. Kagia, if I have to choose between my life and my culture, I choose my life."

In the afternoon, Charity, a senior program officer in our Nairobi office, and I went to see another group that Planned Parenthood supports, Carolina for Kibera. Kibera is a slum area outside Nairobi, which suffered from terrible violence after the election last year. Houses were burned down and mobs attacked individuals based on their ethnicity.

I spoke to a group of peer educators to ask them how they were affected. One answered quietly, "We almost died. We classified ourselves as high-risk and low-risk, depending on our ethnic group. Some of us couldn't go to work, as we knew we'd be targeted. Yet we never closed our clinics. People kept coming. We saw many cases of sexual violence."

Another said, "At that time, I couldn't step into this office because of the tribe I come from. I grew up here, but I had to avoid certain places, as I didn't feel secure. Police were chasing people. There were gunshots and rapes. No one could predict what would happen. Food was a real problem because of blockades. Mobs burnt down shops. The poverty here made the situation very, very hard."

I was amazed to sit in front of these young people and hear their stories. Despite the horrors they witnessed, they still carried out their work educating the community and distributing contraceptives. They've been helped by funds from a PPFA campaign to help the survivors of sexual violence. The demand for emergency contraception, voluntary counseling and testing for HIV, and contraceptives increased after the election.

I brought along some of the Planned Parenthood brand Proper Attire® condoms to share, and they were a huge hit! They loved the designs, and asked me if they could get them in bulk. They said the Kenyan brand of condom they distribute is not popular with young people, and something more colorful and chic would quickly become a hot commodity.

Tomorrow is my birthday! I’ll spend it zooming around Nairobi, visiting other organizations that are also working on reproductive health here.

Veena Siddharth is vice president for international programs at Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

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Travel Diary from Kenya

Blog by: VeenaSiddharth on 11/11/2008

Tags: International , Health , Reproductive Rights , Barack Obama

I landed in Nairobi on Sunday night excited to finally meet all the Planned Parenthood staff in our regional office here.

I felt like I already knew them. I had spoken to all nine staff every day in early January when they were in the midst of post-election violence  that wracked the country. It was a tense and sad time, and no one could have predicted that Kenya would descend into that kind of turmoil. 

I'm happy to say all our staff are well, and Nairobi is bustling.  It’s remarkable how normal things seem now.  And Barack Obama’s election in the U.S. has really lifted spirits here.  There are "Obama-Biden" bumper stickers on cars, and I get big smiles when I say I'm from the U.S.  Barack Obama clearly has friends in Kenya!
 
Behind the excitement, though, is lurking a grim reality: Kenyan statistics for women's health are not good.  Women here have a one in 39 chance of dying from maternity-related causes, and many of these deaths are from unsafe abortions.  Contraceptives are hard to come by. 

Too many women are dying. Planned Parenthood supports a range of local groups in Kenya that are trying to improve the situation for women by ensuring access to contraceptives and fighting for access to safe, legal abortions. 

Tomorrow I’ll attend a taping of a TV show that will feature two ob/gyns in Kenya, former classmates with very different views of the problem of women’s access to health care in Kenya.  One is a member of a network that we support, called the Reproductive Health and Rights Alliance (RHRA), a group of doctors, lawyers, and activists fighting to protect women’s reproductive rights. The other has testified on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, in favor of the global gag rule, which, for the last eight years, has had the effect of denying access for thousands of women. 

But more on that tomorrow … 

Veena Siddharth is vice president for international programs at Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

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Here in Colorado, the news that Barack Obama and Joe Biden were elected hit us around 9:00 p.m., and I've been thankful ever since. Finally, we’ll have a pro-choice president in the White House — a giant step forward for women’s health care!

As I blogged before Election Day, the presidential election wasn't the only thing important to women's health on the ballot in Colorado. Amendment 48, also known as the “Personhood Amendment,” would have given legal rights to fertilized eggs. The amendment would have been a legal nightmare for the courts and a detrimental blow to women’s rights and health care in the state of Colorado.

Over the past months, the Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains Action Fund worked very closely with the No on 48 Campaign. Our goal was to not just defeat this dangerous and extreme amendment, but to destroy it, since winning by a small margin could embolden anti-choice forces.

AND DESTROY IT WE DID!  According to the Rocky Mountain News, as of 1:00 p.m. on November 5, the numbers on Amendment 48 stand at:

Votes                 Percent 
No 1,557,267    73.0%
Yes 575,870      27.0% 

Now, our victory may not deter all anti-choice activity. However, our margin of victory sends a clear message that the people of Colorado will not let a small group of extremists control our health care or our right to choose.

Thank you Colorado!

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The Latino Vote

Blog by: LauraLamb on 11/7/2008

Tags: Elections , United States , Democrats , Health

We knew that women (and their votes) would matter in this election — and, lo and behold, Senator Obama won women by 13 points. But there was a massive wave of newly registered, newly energized, and newly Democratic voters who made a difference, too.

One such voting bloc — Latinos — carries a special significance to Estelle Raboni, director of the Planned Parenthood Latino Outreach Initiative, who seeks to increase awareness of, access to, and advocacy for reproductive health and rights in the Latino community.  Latinos voted for the Obama/Biden ticket by a margin of more than two-to-one, and helped them take the key battleground states of Colorado, Florida, Nevada, and New Mexico.

“For the first time ever, the Planned Parenthood Action Fund disseminated election materials in Spanish,” says Raboni, meaning volunteers on the ground and on the phones were not hindered by a language barrier and could reach even deeper into the Latino community to spread our message for women’s health and reproductive rights.

And while immigration was a key issue for many Latino voters, so was health care. “Latinos are one of the largest groups that lack health insurance coverage, so having a president who has made it his platform to address this issue is important to many Latinos,” she says. “Second only to the economy, health care is one of the bread-and-butter issues affecting Latino women and families everywhere.”

But just as the real work lies ahead for President-elect Obama, Raboni believes its time for Latino activists to gear up for the coming years. “Latinos need to continue to make a difference at the local and state levels, just as we’ve done at the national level.”

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We woke up this morning to an almost unimaginable victory that will change the face of our country forever: the election of Barack Obama as president of the United States of America. 

And the jubilant celebration of his election is not just happening coast to coast, but worldwide.  I just learned from our staff in Kenya that Thursday, November 6, has just been declared a national holiday in honor of Obama’s election!

“We in Kenya are over the moon as we celebrate with the rest of the world in the making of history.  And we are proud to be a part of that history,” our colleagues say. 

I think we can only just begin to imagine the great and transformative significance that Obama’s election will have for the future of our world.  Here we go! 
 

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