Letter to the Editor: Alabama Callous to Women's Health Care

Originally published in the Albany Times Union on June 4, 2019

The majority of Americans are outraged at the hatred sweeping across Republican-controlled states. Alabama is the most recent extreme example of denying women health care. The callousness of the legislators is stunning. Women's lives will be in jeopardy, but they don't care.

If these legislators truly cared about saving lives, they should be working to fix a worsening health care problem in their state, not dismantling what little access to health care Alabamians have left. Watching the 25 white, male state senators who voted, it is clear they just want to control women and not allow them to have control over their own bodies and lives. Their hypocrisy is incredible since there are no laws restricting men's access to any form of health care. Medical decisions for a patient should be made by the patient and her doctor, not politicians.

This is a concerted effort to ban abortions. It is an attack on all women and everyone who loves them. Nearly a dozen states have passed restrictions or bans on abortion so far this year. With President Donald Trump in the White House and Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court, state politicians are emboldened to try to fully ban safe, legal abortion. It is a scary time to be a woman.

People across the country want more health care, not less. They want representatives who will fight the unethical Title X gag rule and increase support for crucial public health programs like sexually transmitted infections testing/treatment, cancer screenings and other essential care furnished by quality providers such as Planned Parenthood.

Cathie Love

Join Planned Parenthood in HUDSON for #StopTheBans: National Day of Action on Tuesday, May 21st!

As you may have heard the BANS on abortion keep coming so we KEEP RALLYING! In an effort to include our Columbia and Greene County advocates and highlight our new center, our rally for the National Day of Action will be in Hudson.

Here are the details:

On May 21, activists in all 50 states will take to the streets with rallies and mobilizations happening at state capitols, town squares, courthouses and health centers to say #StoptheBans. If you are outraged by recent restrictions and limitations on abortion access join Planned Parenthood outside our new Hudson Health Center for a Honk and Wave event to show you STAND STRONG FOR ABORTION ACCESS. We will provide the PINK swag!

This is a terrifying time for women in America. Anti-women’s health politicians are pushing dangerous policies that will endanger women’s lives and the public’s health. Planned Parenthood will not sit by and watch as politicians take our rights and freedoms to women's health care away. We will fight in Missouri, Georgia, Alabama, and everywhere else politicians interfere with medical care, because women’s health care is health care and health care is a human right.

JOIN US! 

Location: 804 Columbia Street in Hudson (Planned Parenthood in Hudson)
Date: TUESDAY, May 21
Time: 5:30 to 6:30 pm

We will provide the PINK! PLEASE RSVP AND SHARE our Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/917041565307584/

Letter: We Will Not Go Back!

I am a retired female OB/GYN.

Doctors and nurses in my field are fortunate to live in the great state of NY where women are respected and valued. Here a woman enjoys privacy and trust in her relationship with her medical care provider in the most intimate part of her life, deciding when she is capable of becoming a good mother.

I graduated from medical school the year NYS legalized abortion and then began my OB/GYN training. The difference legalization made was profound.

Before that wealthy women had access to legal abortions by traveling out of the country, and the rest of the women had to seek out illegal providers (including mafia) or try to do it by themselves. As gynecology residents, we took care of the results in the Emergency Room; bleeding, febrile victims often in extremis.

It is alarming that presently politicians (usually well-off white males) in many states are targeting the health care safety net of women and their families by criminalizing abortion as well as threatening Medicaid and Title X with the gag rule. The cruel result of this will of course be to disrupt families that have a tenuous grip on middle class life and to take away the hope of the poor. Medical care for all women will be degraded, and sisters, mothers and daughters will suffer and die unnecessarily.

I am grateful to live in NYS where medical professionals do not have to worry about going to jail for doing our job properly. Access to the life saving benefits of modern health care should not depend on one’s wealth and gender.

Margaret M. Craven, M.D.

Letter: Reproductive Health Act empowers women

Originally published in the Albany Times Union -- March 4, 2019

It is a power shift, empowering women. It is justice and aligning with the law of the land. It is one's right to self-determination. It is New York state's Reproductive Health Act, made law on Jan. 22.

It took nearly five decades of tenacity, advocacy and leadership, but finally the women of New York have been given the power that previously was denied them. Now, women coming from many backgrounds and holding different beliefs have this in common: the power of self-determination with respect to their own reproductive health. Each woman is now guaranteed the right to make her own personal health care decisions with her health care provider throughout the course of her pregnancy. Should complications arise later in pregnancy, medical professionals may now provide needed care.

In short, the women of New York are no longer subject to political ideologies that jeopardize their health, and they are now allowed to make their own compassionate decision with a health care professional that they trust.

The passage of the Reproductive Health Act is cause for celebration indeed. However, misinformation and fearmongering are the watchwords of many, and it is imperative that we who believe in access to safe, legal abortion and oppose restrictions on that access raise our voices in continued support of reproductive health for all women.

Dawn Jablonski

The Trump-Pence Gag Rule: The Facts

After months of waiting, the Trump Pence Administration finally released the text for the Title X changes that include the Gag Rule. The new rule does three things:

1. The rule prohibits Title X projects from referring patients for abortion—the so-called “gag rule”—and also removes the current requirement that patients must be given access to non-directive counseling on all of their options, including abortion unless the patient’s life it at risk.
2. The rule imposes cost-prohibitive and unnecessary “physical and financial” separation requirements on Title X recipients, which are aimed at excluding abortion providers like Planned Parenthood from Title X.
3. The rule contains a host of other provisions that are designed to reduce access to quality family planning care in communities across the country

It’s infuriating that the Trump-Pence administration is once again trying to control women’s bodies and take away our rights. The Trump Gag Rule bans doctors from providing their patients with full information about their health care options, including abortion. It would also effectively dismantle the Title X program, which provides birth control, cancer screenings, and other essential reproductive health care to folks with low incomes.

Know this — Planned Parenthood will always be here for our patients and will continue to fight for everyone’s ability to get affordable, quality health care. We are still working toward a world in which everyone has the freedom and opportunity to control our lives at the most basic level: our bodies, our families, and our life’s path. Health care is a human right and we will not let this stand. The Trump-Pence administration may not think our patients deserve care, but we do.

This rule is opposed by the general public, the medical community, lawmakers, and public health experts. When the rule was announced, nearly 500,000 Americans submitted comments to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services voicing their opposition.

Remember, this rule is so much bigger than Planned Parenthood. It prohibits ANY health care providers in Title X across the country — doctors, nurses, hospitals, and community health centers — from referring their patients for safe, legal abortion, and it removes the guarantee that patients are getting full and accurate information about their health care.

The ruling was just released Friday and already the Attorney General of Washington State has announced they have filed a lawsuit against it. UHPP is working with our statewide partners, the national office, our legislators and the Governor’s office to protect Title X funding in New York State. In addition, we will continue to raise funds for our Patient Access Fund in order to protect us from anything the federal government throws at us. This is going to be another long fight but we are confident we will prevail and we know that the work we do for our patients must continue. No matter what.

Katherine Bruno, CXO

Roe v Wade Anniversary Event and RHA!

Hey all, sorry it's been a while since we've had an update. Things, as you can imagine, have been a little nuts around here.

This Tuesday, Jan 22, is the anniversary of the passage of Roe v Wade, making access to safe, legal
abortion the law of the land. With the confirmation of Justice Kavanaugh to the US Supreme Court, we have been worried about the future of Roe v Wade. Therefore, we decided to have our annual Roe v Wade event on the actual anniversary this year.

The event begins at 5:30PM on 1/22/19 at the Renaissance Hotel in Albany. Tickets include beer, wine and soda, and hot and cold hors d'oeuvres. We will be honoring Eleanor's Legacy and the NYS Bipartisan Pro-Choice Legislative Caucus, and our Keynote speaker for the evening will be NYS Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins.  We would love for you to join us, and you can purchase your ticket here.

The other amazing thing going on that day, is the long-awaited passage (we hope) of the Reproductive Health Act (RHA).  If you're not sure what that is, here are some cliff's notes.

• NYS legalized abortion three years before Roe v Wade, and is out of date. RHA will make it consistent with federal law.
• One of the ways it is inconsistent with federal law, is that it is listed in the NYS penal code, not the health code. We hope to remedy that with RHA.
• Our antiquated state law lacks a health exception, forcing individuals to leave our state for care later in pregnancy, in the rare and tragic cases when their health is at risk or a fetus is not viable.

This has been ten years in the making, so we will be gathering at the Capitol to rally and hopefully witness the passage of the bill on the Assembly and Senate floors. Please join us for this exciting and important moment. We will be gathering at three. The details are in the facebook event I linked to above, but it is important that you register if you plan to join us. This is a free event, but we need to have a tally of who will be joining us for security purposes.

This is a very exciting time to be a New Yorker, which is refreshing when juxtaposed with all the terrible nonsense happening in Washington. We hope you will join us!

WARNING: 'Crisis Pregnancy Centers' Are Not Legitimate Health Centers

It's no secret that with the current political climate, anti-choice and alt-right fanatics have been emboldened by rhetoric that enables and even encourages reckless behavior.  While this particular issue isn't exactly new, it is becoming more widespread in the face of this encouragement.

The Hendrick Hudson Buuilding
200 Broadway, Troy

The downtown Troy, NY Planned Parenthood is currently being plagued by one such anti-choice organization. They have purchased a van and are attempting to lure women away from the Troy Planned Parenthood office by offering them ultrasounds (in a van? Oh that's not creepy). This is made more confusing by the fact that the building that currently houses the Troy health center will not allow any outside branded signage, so sometimes patients aren't sure they are in the right place. We have heard reports of women being given bad directions to Planned Parenthood by the van's inhabitants, and made to wander around Troy, missing their appointments.

The van does not currently have a permit, and we don't know if there are even any legitimate trained medical professionals on board. Katherine Bruno, Chief Experience Officer for Upper Hudson Planned Parenthood (UHPP), has this to say about the van:

This mobile ultrasound unit has been parked in cities across Upstate New York and is most often parked in the city of Troy very near the Planned Parenthood Health Center on Broadway.

UHPP has spoken with the Troy Mayor's Office and the City Clerk. The clerk confirms that in order for anyone to be on the streets of Troy offering services of any kind, they need a permit. This mobile unit does not have one, nor have they applied for one once it was made clear that it was required. The City Clerk has communicated this with the Deputy Mayor and the Chief of Police. All city officials are aware that the van cannot be on the street offering services of any kind without a permit.

When the van arrived on Broadway across from the UHPP Health Center entrance in July, the police were called and the police did nothing. UHPP has been reassured by city officials that this is not what is supposed to happen. Once again UHPP has voiced concern and has clarified that should the van reappear, Troy Police should ask them to leave until they acquire a permit.

These anti-choice organizations make it their mission to mislead young women. Patients reported not understanding the difference between Planned Parenthood and one of these other centers, and more and more of them are popping up around the country, a situation to which this post from Lifehacker can attest.  Apparently, one of them in West Virginia was so convincingly misleading, that they were vandalized by other anti-choice fanatics. This is the sign they put up addressing their vandals:

Kudos on the trickery, Women's Choice Pregnancy Center; it looks like it really paid off for you. In fact, the very name "Women's Choice Pregnancy Center" is a fallacy, because it implies that they actually care about women's choices.

Elizabeth Clark, Director of Media Health for Planned Parenthood, offers this advice for recognizing a phony health center:

“Crisis pregnancy centers often purposely use language, in their advertising or signs, that mimic legitimate, licensed health care providers. They use names that are similar to actual healthcare providers. Be really suspicious of what you’re reading. Crisis pregnancy centers are not required to be true medical facilities and are not required to provide accurate information about health care. Look to see if there are licensed medical staff. Are there licensed clinicians? What are the services they say they provide?”

When in doubt, call Planned Parenthood directly, at 1-800-230-PLAN, and they will help set up an appointment at your closest health center, or visit www.plannedparenthood.org and make your appointment online.  If you see something super shady, tell someone. And whatever you do, definitely don't get into some creepy van.