What The Mainstream Media Misses About Texas’ Ongoing Abortion Battle

[Tx4obama]

What The Mainstream Media Misses About Texas’ Ongoing Abortion Battle

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In its coverage of the ongoing fight, the media is obviously interested in putting Texas’ proposed legislation — which would criminalize abortions after 20 weeks and force the vast majority of the state’s abortion clinics to close — into a broader context. The New York Times mapped out the public opinion on 20-week abortion bans. Following the same logic, Politico referred to Texas’ abortion proposal as a “bill that polls well” since “support for legal abortions drops dramatically after the first trimester.” The Washington Post pointed out that multiple other states already have 20-week bans on the books. Fox News referred to protests over a “strict abortion bill banning the procedure after the 20th week of pregnancy,” and a Washington Post columnist characterized Sen. Wendy Davis (D) as fighting for late-term abortion rights. And it’s easy to draw comparisons between Texas’ proposed ban and the national 20-week ban introduced in the House and, potentially, the Senate.

The implications of banning abortions at 20 weeks, which is an effective method of chipping away at the legal protections under Roe v. Wade, is an important part of the conversation. But many of the narratives the media is crafting about Texas’ abortion fight aren’t actually getting at the full scope of the story.

In addition to criminalizing abortion services after 20 weeks, the other provisions in Texas’ abortion proposals would impose harsh restrictions on abortion providers. By subjecting abortion clinics to new regulations that would force them to make expensive updates to their facilities — unnecessary measures that major medical groups, like the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, oppose — Texas’ bill would force 90 percent of the state’s clinics to close their doors. That would leave just five abortion clinics in the entire Lone Star State, which happens to be the second most populous state in the country.

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And the real catch? Outside of the debate about abortion access after 20 weeks — even outside of the fight for abortion rights altogether — the “abortion clinics” in question are often providing health services that encompass much more than helping women terminate a pregnancy. Many of them also provide preventative care, family planning counseling, STD testing, and cancer screenings. And they offer those health services to Texans of both genders who are typically uninsured.

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Full article here: http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/07/03/2253921/texas-ongoing-abortion-battle/

[dixiegrrrrl]

1. These clinics ....would they be forced to close???

After all, as the post says...the clinics are

providing health services that encompass much more than helping women terminate a pregnancy.
Many of them also provide preventative care, family planning counseling, STD testing, and cancer screenings.
And they offer those health services to Texans of both genders who are typically uninsured.

So they could continue to do all that, just not do abortions, couldn't they?

[Ilsa]

2. They'll probably close because

The state slashed family planning funding that supports those clinics:

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/10/01/932211/texas-legislature-crusade-abortion/?mobile=wt

Low-income women in Texas are more likely to get pregnant thanks to their state legislature’s crusade against abortion.

This year, Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) stopped state funds from going to clinics he considers abortion “affiliates.” That disqualified the state from receiving any federal Women’s Health Program funding, destabilizing the entire program. Around the same time, the state legislature voted to cut overall family planning services for publicly-funded clinics in the state. In the end, Texas clinics were left high and dry and looking for cash.

The result? A new study from the New England Journal of Medicine reveals that cash-strapped Texas clinics are now unable to provide the most effective types of birth control to the women who need public assistance for contraception. Instead, they’re forced to use methods that are less effective at preventing pregnancy:

To continue serving as many clients as possible, clinics now rarely offer IUDs or implants, reserving these methods for women with medical contraindications to other contraceptives. Some providers have started waiting lists for IUDs and implants in the unlikely event that they can purchase them with money left over at the end of a funding period. In addition, as more women are steered toward contraceptive pills, they are being provided with fewer pill packs per visit, a practice that has been shown to result in lower rates of continuation with the method and that may increase the likelihood of unintended pregnancy — and therefore that of abortion.

The cognitive dissonance in the Texas legislature’s plan is apparent. Although GOP lawmakers intend to target health clinics like Planned Parenthood for providing abortion services, their move to slash funds for women’s health services have far-reaching effects that actually undermine their goal of lowering the abortion rate in the state. Higher rates of unplanned pregnancy lead to higher rates of abortions. And less funding for women’s health leads to more unintended pregnancies — particularly among women in poverty for whom having a child is not a viable economic option, and especially as the legislature in Texas simultaneously makes it harder to afford kids.

[Ilsa]

3. The people doing this are screwing themselves up.

These women will be forced into bearing more children. The only good news I can see is that maybe they'll be democratic voters in 18 years.

[Doctor_J]

4. They're not missing anything

they're disseminating right-wing propaganda just like they do on every issue.