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How the Hyde Amendment Discriminates Against Poor Women and Women of Color

vochoice:

In 1973 the Supreme Court decided in the landmark case Roe v. Wade to recognize the constitutional right to abortion for all women. Forty years later, however, this guarantee remains an empty promise for thousands of poor women and women of color thanks to the Hyde Amendment, an annual appropriations measure first passed in 1976. This provision intentionally discriminates against poor women by prohibiting Medicaid, the health-insurance program for low-income individuals and families, from covering abortion care.

Because of the intersection in our country between race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status, this restriction also has a disproportionate impact on women of color. Due to a number of root causes related to inequality, women of color are more likely to qualify for government insurance that restricts abortion coverage, more likely to experience higher rates of unintended pregnancy, and less likely to be able to pay for an abortion out of pocket. The Hyde Amendment therefore does not only undermine gender equity, but it also violates principles of racial and economic justice.

The Hyde Amendment discriminates against poor women

• Congress passed the Hyde Amendment in order to deny poor women access to abortion. Former Rep. Henry Hyde (R-IL), the law’s sponsor, admitted during the debate of his proposal that he was targeting poor women. “I certainly would like to prevent, if I could legally, anybody having an abortion, a rich woman, a middle-class woman, or a poor woman,” he said. “Unfortunately, the only vehicle available is the … Medicaid bill.”
• 1 in 10 women of reproductive age in the United States relies on Medicaid for their health coverage. By prohibiting Medicaid from covering abortion services, the Hyde Amendment has used the primary source of health care for low-income women to restrict access to abortion.
• Poor women face significant disparities when it comes to reproductive health.Compared with higher-income women, poor women’s rates of unintended pregnancy and abortion are each five times as high, and their unplanned birth rate is six times as high. These disparities are rooted in deeply entrenched inequities in the areas of health-insurance coverage, health care, and medically accurate sex education, as well as other health-promoting resources.
• Abortion costs between $300 and $950 in the first trimester, making it unaffordable for poor women without insurance coverage. In 2009 more than half of nonelderly adult women enrolled in Medicaid had family incomes below the poverty level; one-quarter had incomes below 50 percent of the poverty level. The monthly income for a family of three living at half the current poverty level is $813.75.
• One in four Medicaid-qualified women who seek an abortion is forced to carry her pregnancy to term because of cost. Many more are forced to delay their procedure for as long as two to three weeks while they raise money, with the costs and risks of the procedure increasing the longer they wait.

The Hyde Amendment discriminates against women of color

• A dissenting Supreme Court opinion recognized that the Hyde Amendment was discriminatory. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall’sdissenting opinion in Harris v. McRaenoted that the law was “designed to deprive poor and minority women of the constitutional right to choose abortion.”
• Women of color are disproportionately poor and therefore less likely to be able to pay out of pocket for their health care. According to 2011 census data, 25.5 percent of African Americans and 25 percent of Latinas are living below the poverty level, compared to only 10.4 percent of whites and 12.2 percent of Asians. Moreover, certain groups of Asian and Pacific Islander women face much higher poverty rates than are reflected in the aggregate census data. For example, 67 percent, 66 percent, and 47 percent of people of Laotian, Hmong, and Cambodian descent, respectively, live in poverty in the United States.
• Women of color are more likely to be enrolled in government insurance. In 2011, 40.9 percent of African American females and 36.3 percent of Latinas had government-based insurance, including 29.2 percent and 29.6 percent participation, respectively, in Medicaid. In contrast, 32.6 percent of white females and 24.4 percent of Asian American females got their insurance through a government program. While Asian and Pacific Islander women use Medicaid at lower rates for a variety of reasons—only 6 percent were enrolled in the program in 2004—participation is quite high among various subgroups. For example, 20 percent of women of Southeast Asian descent are covered by Medicaid.
• Women of color are disproportionately more likely to need an abortion. Black women had the highest unintended pregnancy rate of any racial or ethnic group and more than double that of non-Hispanic white women. The unintended pregnancy rate of Latinas is 78 percent higher than the non-Hispanic rate. These high unintended pregnancy rates are part of the reason women of color seek abortion at higher rates than non-Hispanic whites. Although they represent much smaller segments of the population as a whole, black and Latina women comprise 30 percent and 25 percent of women who have abortions, respectively. Data on Asian and Pacific Islander women’s utilization of health services, including abortion, is extremely limited, but one study has shown that 35 percent of pregnancies for Asian and Pacific Islander women end in abortion, compared to 18 percent for non-Hispanic white women.
• These health disparities mirror other health disparities that women of color experience. Inaddition to higher rates of unintended pregnancy and abortion, women of color face higher rates of reproductive cancers, HIV and other sexually transmitted infections, premature births, low birth weights, and maternal and infant morbidity and mortality. They also encounter poorer health outcomes for diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and obesity, among other health conditions.
• Root causes of inequality drive the health disparities women of color face. Differential access to treatment, lower levels of respect and competency from health care providers, lack of trust in the medical establishment, lack of accurate information, and a host of other socioeconomic factors lead to poorer outcomes along racial and ethnic lines for overall health indicators, specifically with regard to reproductive health.

The Hyde Amendment treats the rights of women in this country according to two different standards: whether you can afford to pay for your rights or not. That is not equality.

Repealing the Hyde Amendment and similar restrictions will not, by itself, ensure full equality for poor women and women of color. But doing so is a necessary precondition. Anyone who cares about fighting racism and poverty must realize that attacks on abortion—and especially on abortion coverage—are first and foremost attacks on poor women and women of color.

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secularwoman:

Crisis Pregnancy Centers, bad for women everywhere.

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They Are Coming for Your Birth Control: ‘Do We Want to Make the Pill Illegal? Yes!’

vochoice:

Think that anti-choice politicians and activists aren’t trying to outlaw contraception? Think again. Follow along in an ongoing series that proves beyond a doubt that they really are coming for your birth control.

Move over, 16 and Pregnant. MTV has a new message for teens that may be way more effective when it comes to educating them on sex and contraceptives.

Watch out for the rabid anti-choicers!

The network’s True Life series often focuses on unusual or controversial characters to draw in viewers, but a winter episode went beyond “I Hate My Body” or “I Have a Weird Habit” to an even darker place. “I Hate the Government” follows three young adults who say they don’t trust the government and have joined groups to “reform” it: a teenage Tea Party activist, a young woman trying to break into the militia movement, and an anti-choice extremist.

The show follows Andrew Beacham, who believes the current government needs to be tossed aside because it has abandoned the Bible. In watching the show, however, it becomes clear that the 28-year-old activist really is there simply to give camera time to former Operation Rescue founder Randall Terry. Beacham, as Terry’s accolade, is shown protesting with him, creating graphic abortion campaign ads, and even moving into a group home where the goal is to find a way to end all abortion.

But it’s not just abortion that they are targeting. Terry makes it clear that to be truly “pro-life,” you have to outlaw anything that will allow someone to have sex without risking pregnancy, childbirth, or parenthood—even if that means putting women in jail for avoiding pregnancy.

Terry: Without a clear message of “This is what it means to be pro-life,” then we’re doomed.

Beacham: Nobody articulates our message better than Randall.

Terry: Do we want to make the pill illegal? Yes. Do we want to make the IUD illegal? Yes. The morning after pill? Yes. The patch? Yes. Anything that’s a human pesticide, they all have to be made illegal. A woman has to go to jail if she kills her baby.

Of course, a number of anti-choice activists would bend over backwards to say that Terry doesn’t represent the mainstream of the movement. After all, the current Operation Rescue group is in constant battle to affirm its distance from its former leader. Yet although they may disagree with Terry’s newer tactics, such as purposefully getting arrested in public places or running political ads on television for the sole purpose of showing graphic images on screen, no one mentions disagreeing with his view of what it means to be “pro-life.”

In fact, much of what Terry said can be found echoed in the words of current office holders, from Sen. Dick Black (R-VA) to Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ).Even the anti-choice action group Population Research Institute argues against “human pesticides” like contraception being used to stop the creation of the “most precious resource”: more people.

The “outlaw birth control” mindset isn’t playing well with the MTV bunch, if the comments responding to the show are any indication. Hopefully, they will continue to be outraged over the idea, because soon they will learn that it isn’t just Terry they have to worry about.

The entire anti-choice movement is coming for your birth control.

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In El Salvador, a woman fights for her life while waiting for Supreme Court to approve her abortion

stfuconservatives:

rhrealitycheck:

A 22-year-old Salvadoran woman with severe chronic medical conditions is pregnant with a fetus without a brain. But a 1998 law in El Salvador prohibits all abortions, without exception.

Within the past few days Amnesty International has initiated a petition asking for life-saving medical care, including an abortion; the United Nations has spoken; and the Salvadoran Minister of Health, Dr. Maria Isabel Rodriguez, has requested that the Supreme Court approve the request. Dr. Rodriguez emphasized that Beatriz’s kidney function continues to deteriorateas the pregnancy advances, and that the public health system is ready to perform an abortion. The Salvadoran Attorney General for Human Rights also supports the request.

Beatriz’s life is threatened by her health conditions and a high-risk pregnancy. However, the deeper threats come from an intractable and misogynistic political and religious system which criminalizes women for being young, poor, rural women.  Right now the eyes and voices of  the world constitute Beatriz’ hope for life. She wants to live.

This is what happens when abortion is illegal. Feel good about this, pro-lifers?

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Virginia Assembly Votes to Deny Citizens Ability to Purchase Private Coverage of Abortion Care

rhrealitycheck:

Nothing says “small government” like forbidding people to use their own money to pay for legal services.

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KEEP NORTH DAKOTA'S ONLY ABORTION CLINIC OPEN: Sign the petition!

SB 2305, which will be sent to the governor for his signature by this Thursday, places unnecessary conditions on providers of safe abortion care in a blatant effort to close the Red River Women’s Clinic, the last remaining provider in the state.  

Without Red River, people seeking safe abortion care will incur much higher costs in terms of travel and time away from family and work to seek safe abortion care in another state. It may even force them to postpone an abortion until later in their pregnancy when it becomes more difficult.

The bill’s sponsors say they’re looking out for patient safety by requiring abortion providers to have hospital admitting privileges. Local hospitals won’t approve these privileges for Red River because the rates of complications are so low that they don’t even meet the hospitals’ minimum requirement of needing to refer 10 patients a year. The truth is that longer wait times and later term abortions are the real patient safety threat.

To sum up, SB 2305 will shut down the Red River Women’s Clinic for being too safe a place to get one of the safest medical procedures there is.

Tell Gov. Dalrymple to remember that he has a duty to protect the rights and well-being of all the citizens of his state, even if they are women or just have the ability to get pregnant, and veto SB 2305.

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UN Report Classifies Lack Of Access to Abortion as "Torture"

stfuprolifers:

United Nations special rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment, Juan E. Méndez, came out with his yearly report on torture last month. This year’s report “focuses on certain forms of abuses in health-care settings that may cross a threshold of mistreatment that is tantamount to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” Among other things, Méndez specifically cites lack of access to abortion.

Méndez, a long-time human rights worker and visiting professor of Law at American University, details in his report global human rights abuses and offers recommendations on how to correct these issues. Included in the report is also discussion of “compulsory detention for drug users.”

In the report, Mendez writes:

Persons who use, or are suspected of using, drugs and who do not voluntarily opt for drug treatment and rehabilitation are confined [and are then] compelled to undergo diverse interventions. 

Such interventions, Méndez notes, are often tantamount to torture. Citing numerous other studies, the UN report states that detainees are often subject to, “painful withdrawal from drug dependence without medical assistance, administration of unknown or experimental medications, State-sanctioned beatings, caning or whipping, forced labor, sexual abuse and intentional humiliation.”

Last year, the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Reproductive Rights, Anand Grover, broke major ground by demanding the removal, without delay, of all barriers with regard to reproductive access globally, as well as granted access to contraception. In his report, Grover declared denial of access to abortion as discriminatory. Coupled with the new report from the Special Rapporteur on Torture, women’s rights activists worldwide are cheering.

In his report, Méndez, too, holds that denial of reproductive justice is discrimination on the basis of gender and denial of that right can cause “tremendous and lasting physical and emotional suffering” to women. According to the Special Rapporteur’s report, such violations include:

Abusive treatment and humiliation in institutional settings; involuntary sterilization; denial of legally available health services such as abortion and post-abortion care; forced abortions and sterilizations; female genital mutilation; violations of medical secrecy and confidentiality in health-care settings, such as denunciations of women by medical personnel when evidence of illegal abortion is found; and the practice of attempting to obtain confessions as a condition of potentially life-saving medical treatment after abortion.

The importance of the report cannot be understated. In the past, human rights organizations such as Amnesty International have called upon the United Nations Committee against Torture to intervene in countries such as Nicaragua where a total ban on abortion and criminalization of doctors who provide the procedure and women and girls who obtain them has been instated. Nicaragua’s penal code goes so far as to penalize women who undergo miscarriages as it is often hard to discern between a miscarriage (or spontaneous abortion) and a selective abortion. Indeed, Amnesty reports that doctors and nurses are hesitant to treat extremely ill patients for fear that they may in turn harm the fetus and find themselves facing jail time. This new UN report, specifically referring to denial by the state of the right to safely terminate an unwanted pregnancy as torture or ill treatment, is promising for moving women’s rights forward globally and in hopefully reversing such dangerous bans as in Nicaragua. 

Moreover, the report highlights the importance of eliminating government bureaucracy in women’s health care – particularly with regards to rape survivors seeking abortion care. Throwing in boulders in the way of women’s access to health care serves no legitimate purpose but to humiliate and hinder the rights of women to obtain a basic right. Even allowing abortion only in the case of rape or incest puts the burden on a woman to prove that she was a victim of such a trauma. Doing such only strains government resources, and more importantly, severely inconveniences women seeking care by forcing them to jump through hoops in pursuit of a simple medical procedure. 

The special rapporteur demands for legal abortion worldwide, as well as ensuring safe and available access to abortion. This is an important point because without ready access to abortion there is no such thing as reproductive choice.

The full report by the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Torture can be read here.

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