Blogs Comment On Health Reform, Maternal Mortality, Breast Cancer, Other Topics

The following summarizes selected women's health-related blog entries.

White House To Meet With Antiabortion Activists Next Week," Jake Tapper, ABC News' "Political Punch": Melody Barnes, domestic policy adviser to President Obama and director of the Domestic Policy Council, and White House Director of Public Liaison Tina Tchen on Thursday will meet with Charmaine Yoest of Americans United for Life Action to discuss reproductive rights-related issues in health reform proposals, the blog entry says. According to Yoest, the meetings' participants will discuss abortion, provider "conscience" clauses and care for the elderly. The meeting comes after Yoest wrote a letter to Obama in June. In the letter, Yoest said that health reform legislation "would delegate to bureaucratic committees the role of determining the minimum benefits that any private or public health care plan must offer," including family planning and abortion services. Yoest wrote that she is concerned that the bills do not include language that explicitly excludes coverage for abortion services, adding, "We're a non-partisan group so I felt like we in good faith needed to make the effort" to reach out to the White House (Tapper, "Political Punch," ABC News, 9/11).
"When Planning a Pregnancy Can Save a Woman's Life," Ana Langer, Huffington Post blogs: A recent UNICEF report "is the latest in a series of drumbeats for a concerted, large-scale campaign to save the lives of mothers and newborns worldwide, far too many of whom are dying from entirely preventable causes," Langer, president of EngenderHealth, writes. She adds that Congress should approve a spending increase for family planning and maternal health in the fiscal year 2010 Foreign Operations Bill (S 1434). According to Langer, 99% of the more than half million maternal deaths per year occur in developing countries, "where maternal care is scarce." The U.S. "can do our part" to reduce maternal mortality "by doing more to fund lifesaving efforts" like family planning services, Langer continues. "Education about, and access to, contraception is also critical for saving lives ... because when women and their partners are empowered to decide if and when to have children, it can significantly reduce the likelihood that mothers will die in childbirth," Langer writes. She adds, "In this day and age, no woman should die giving life," and "no woman should die because she was unable to plan her pregnancy." The health of women and their children "is the currency that stabilizes communities and allows for economic development," Langer continues, concluding, "That's what family planning is about, and it's why [it] should be included in any global effort to protect the lives of women and newborns" (Langer, Huffington Post blogs, 9/14).
"Stoking Fire: Anti-Choicers Target Komen Foundation," Eleanor Bader, RH Reality Check: The well-documented fact that an abortion or miscarriage does not increase a woman's risk of developing breast cancer "has failed to quiet" antiabortion groups and endocrinologist Joel Brind of Baruch College, who first claimed a link between abortion and breast cancer in the early 1980s, Bader writes. She adds that "apparently, preaching to their own hasn't gotten the antis adequate play, so they are now targeting Susan G. Komen for the Cure," a group that advocates for breast cancer treatment and research. The organization, which has raised more than $60 million for research, has been "dubbed ... a menace to women" by Roman Catholic dioceses across the U.S. and organizations like STOPP, an affiliate of the American Life League, Bader writes. She continues, "The naysayers have two objections," including "advis[ing] women to begin reproducing when they are young and warn[ing] them about the abortion/breast cancer connection." Bader adds, "Not surprisingly, this contention has gained little traction, even among right-wingers, so the anti-Komen posse has trucked out a reliable antiabortion bugaboo," the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, which receives grants for breast cancer screening and education programs from Komen. "Although it's far too soon to predict the upshot of the federal health care battle, by all accounts the anti-Komen campaign has fallen flat, doing little to hamper the group's ongoing efforts," Bader says (Bader, RH Reality Check, 9/15).
"Rights Group Calls Obama's Comments on Abortion in Health Reform 'Lamentable,'" Jodi Jacobson, RH Reality Check: Jacobson writes, "For women's rights groups, who saw health reform as a chance to advance reproductive justice -- including equity access for low-income women to all legal reproductive and sexual health services including abortion care -- the past few months have been a serious disappointment." According to Jacobson, "Disorganization and lack of clear leadership from the White House and Congress [have] left the Democrats once again ceding the conversation and the political territory to the far right." She adds, "Now, even in a compromise in which no federal funding for legal abortion services for women will be allowed, the president has been persistently reinforcing, if only rhetorically, the barriers low-income women face to care, and to exercising their basic human rights to whether, when and with whom to have children." She reports that the Center for Reproductive Rights has "openly expressed disappointment in the process and in the president's comments on abortion funding in his speech" last Wednesday to Congress. Jacobson includes a statement from CRR President Nancy Northup. She concludes, "There is as yet no guarantee that the Capps Amendment -- which protects the rights of women to access to abortion care under private insurance even where federal funding subsidies exist for some enrollees -- will survive the legislative process, and far right groups and legislators continue to mislead on the issue of abortion care in health reform" (Jacobson, RH Reality Check, 9/11).
"Did Sebelius Back More Steps for Banning Abortion Funding in Health Care?" Dan Gilgoff, U.S. News & World Report's "God & Country": Gilgoff writes that comments from HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius during an appearance Sunday on ABC's "This Week" "seemed to suggest that President Obama would go further than the current House health care bill (HR 3200) does in preventing public financing of abortions." However, Gilgoff says, a "second reading of her remarks makes it pretty clear that she's merely seconding Obama's previous commitment to preventing government money from funding abortion." He concludes, "Religious conservatives disagree, but I don't think Sebelius' comments mean that Obama's coming around to their side" (Gilgoff, "God & Country," U.S. News & World Report, 9/14).
Reprinted with kind permission from nationalpartnership. You can view the entire Daily Women's Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery here. The Daily Women's Health Policy Report is a free service of the National Partnership for Women & Families, published by The Advisory Board Company.


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