Women's Rights and Health Insurance Reform

[asterroc]

An open letter to my senators and representatives.

I am writing to you today regarding the health care reform bill currently before the house and senate.

The bill as it currently stands sets women's rights back decades. Not only does the bill currently not provide access to safe, legal abortions, but it also does not provide access to the hormonal birth control which would reduce the necessity for abortions. If women are not provided access to safe legal abortions, some women will be forced return to back alley hack-job abortions, coat hanger abortions, or chemical abortions. The greatest benefit of Roe vs. Wade was not that it allowed women to have abortions, women were already having them, but allowing women to have SAFE abortions. In addition, removing access to hormonal birth control will only increase the need for illegal unsafe abortions.

What's even worse is that the bill as it currently stands does not allow for pelvic exams, a necessary routine yearly medical examination for the physical health of women. This routine preventative exam helps catch the early stages of fertility and life threatening diseases such as ovarian cancer or cervical cancer. Removing access to such exams threatens the lives of every woman on such a health plan, and will increase health care costs in the long run through treating the full blown disease instead of preventing it. In addition only women are being denied access to routine exams, giving the message that only men should have the right to good health care.

I urge you to work towards a more equitable health care bill by supporting any amendments that would provide access to abortion, to hormonal birth control, and to pelvic exams.

Look up your Reps and send your letter here.

Comments

[lurfmonkey.livejournal.com]

Yes, there should be a stipulation for the woman's health. If the Senate bill holds, it should be better on that front.

Rather than repeat myself, see my comments above on abortion. I just wanted to address this:

It is much less expensive to provide an abortion than pay for the medical costs of pregnancy, delivery, and the child's medical expenses, some of which -are- mandatory for insurers to cover.

Part of me believes that expense shouldn't be such a big factor in the decision to have an abortion. It's kind of implying that the less costly an a abortion is, the more likely the woman is going to have one. You could also argue that it's cheaper to execute a prisoner than it is to keep him or her in prison for life or rehabilitate them. Should these decisions be driven by cost? It's a tricky line. For those who need abortions, it shouldn't bankrupt them. On the other hand, the woman shouldn't have an abortion if she would have carried the baby to term without issue if she couldn't afford the abortion.

It's already up to insurers whether or not to cover pelvic exams and contraception. My argument is not that the bill makes things better. It's just that I don't see how it makes things worse as the open letter states.

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

Re:costs - one of the reasons given to leave contraception out of the list of things that must be covered was cost. As in, "if we have to pay for X amount, that will increase the total cost of the bill too much," ignoring the fact that -not- covering contraception will lead to a variety of more expensive results, including things that the bill said must be covered, like costs for some children's health coverage.

[sildra.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, the woman shouldn't have an abortion if she would have carried the baby to term without issue if she couldn't afford the abortion.

How would she even know if she could have carried a baby to term without issue? I say this because a good friend of mine nearly bled to death during childbirth--despite being at a first-rate hospital--and ended up with sufficiently severe permanent brain damage due to the loss of blood that she had to quit her job. Now, three years later, she still collapses if she tries to walk too far or go up more than a small flight of stairs. In her case it was a wanted pregnancy. But in the case of an unwanted pregnancy, the risks--including ones like this that can't be predicted--seem sufficiently high that a woman shouldn't be coerced into going through with it.

[lurfmonkey.livejournal.com]

Of course you can't predict what will happen in childbirth. You can't even get an abortion after a certain point, so whether or not you're covered has no bearing. In the case of your friend, I'm sure there was no reason up until childbirth to abort. All indicators probably pointed to a successful pregnancy. That's the situation I'm referring to. If you have warnings about the health of the woman or the baby, then that changes things.

My point is that if the deciding factor for terminating a pregnancy is affordability, I believe that's the wrong criteria. While I'm certainly not saying that's the case with most women, I have known at least two women who had abortions because having the baby would have been an inconvenience. There was no medical reason for the abortions. They were not forced or coerced into having sex. They were not uneducated about the potential consequences of unprotected sex. They just neglected to use birth control while in a long-term relationship. They were not rich by any means, but they were not financially strapped. I don't know if they paid out of pocket or were covered, but they could afford the abortions. If they couldn't, they probably would have had the babies and figured something out. In these cases, money seemed to be the deciding factor between aborting or having a child. I'm not saying it was an easy decision for them because it wasn't, but the fact that the abortion was affordable made it easier for them to decide. It also gave their partners a get out of jail free card, as they had as much responsibility as the women.

Honestly, I don't know what the best solution for coverage is. If you cover everyone, abortions resulting simply out of carelessness will get covered when there are other options. If you put restrictions on coverage, some women who really need them will be denied. I guess the lesser of the two evils would probably be covering abortions for careless pregnancies.

[sirroxton.livejournal.com]

It's funny. My impression is that your views are deeply offensive to one or more of the people you're communicating with, and yet instead of shouting you down, they're arguing within your selected framework. I've always found that to be kind of a liberal failing. If this conversation were happening in my space, you'd be castigated roundly.

[lurfmonkey.livejournal.com]

It's a failing to argue within a framework rather than engage in shouting matches? How exactly are shouting matches helpful? Look, I'm expressing my opinion. If there are reasonable arguments to the contrary, I will listen. If I'm just denigrated, then no, I will not listen. Personally, I'm not offended if someone disagrees with me if they can tell me their reasons. If they just yell at me and say they're right and I'm wrong, then that accomplishes nothing for either side.

Abortion is a very touchy subject. I realize that, and I don't expect my views to be embraced by everyone. I happen to think that careless pregnancies do exist, and I also think there are some women who view them as inconveniences rather than a complicated matter. I don't feel this is an overgeneralization because I made it clear that it was some women. Not all women are saints just like not all men are. However, it's not up to the insurance companies or the government to make a moral judgment, so I don't think these situations can or should be prevented by laws. They can only be prevented through education.

I know some of my wording didn't get my point across correctly and could be construed as offensive. Perhaps the point is offensive, but I won't pretend to think otherwise. I view coverage of abortions like many other programs. There will always be instances of using the system incorrectly, but for the greater good, they must be endured, and hopefully with better education, they will be reduced. It doesn't mean I'm happy with them. My taxpayer money goes to a lot of things I don't use or agree with, but that's the price I pay for all the good things it does go toward.

I do apologize for hijacking the post and turning it into a debate on abortion. That was not my intent. My initial reply was simply to find out where in the bills the claims in the open letter were referring to because I couldn't find them. I should not have injected my opinion on federally funded abortions.

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

Thank you for your civil reply. I'm okay with this turning into a discussion about funding abortions. I'm not okay with other people cursing at anyone in my space, and thank you for keeping your response civil rather than stooping to his level.

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

Thank you for deleting the first comment before I could, however I would have preferred if you hadn't posted it in the first place. While anger and vituperation do have their place in these sorts of arguments, MY journal is not that place. My rules are that people should be convinced, not yelled at.

[sirroxton.livejournal.com]

I hadn't considered the triggering aspect. I'm genuinely sorry, and will be sensitive of triggers not just in this space, but in others as well.

That said, using: "I find what you believe repugnant, however let me tell you how your own (terrible) framework suggests..." is fine, as long as you frame it that way. If you just work within someone's framework without circumspection, you're abdicating moral authority and perhaps being a little dishonest.

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, disgust is perfectly fine, or channeling your anger into a logically persuasive argument. (It's the control that makes it tolerable to me.)

[sirroxton.livejournal.com]

(It's the control that makes it tolerable to me.)
It's kind of a trap, though, isn't it? We're wired so that being engaged serves as a form of validation, even if the other party isn't actually using explicitly validating language. I believe in well-deserved shame, which requires touchstones. And I don't think the word "stooping" is appropriate. The word "stooping" is appropriate when you address someone with terrible views on women's rights as if they don't.

Please understand that, in my life, it was very, very hard for me to get to the point where I felt like my views matter. Seeing people sell themselves down the river is very much a personal trigger for me. And I don't mean that as a clever and snarky "huh, huh, I have triggers too." It's a real problem for me. I've got a lot of baggage.

I should be clear though - I recognize that verbal assault is a place where reasonable people can agree to disagree. But I think there's a powerful pragmatic point to be made about actual (as opposed to semantic) validation.

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

If a tone has been set to NOT flame people, I try very hard to respect that, and so I am sometimes very grateful that tone is hard to convey/interpret via text. I also find shouting matches stressful, especially when there's no chance of any kind of conversation changing someone's mind, even if I really really really want to flame someone to the waterline and then nuke them from orbit.

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

I appreciate this. IMO "not flaming" isn't the same as "accepting their framework". I think you're doing a good job of expressing your frustration with the other person's viewpoint without getting into the flaming. :)

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

IMO "not flaming" isn't the same as "accepting their framework"

I tend to agree, and wish I better knew how to get other people to argue within -my- framework.

And thanks - I'm usually so steaming angry when I engage in these topics that I can't always tell if the results, when read, come across as angrily as I hear them in my own head.