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January 23, 2006
What good is choice if no one is there to provide it?
There were plenty great articles celebrating yesterday's 33rd anniversary of Roe (including the work of all of our Blog for Choice Day participants!), but this one really stuck out to me.
We talk about the legislative and political blocks to choice so often, that we tend to forget about the basic medical availability of abortion. Amelia Welsh Jones, a second-year medical student at the University of Washington, reminds us of how important this is in a Seattle Post-Intelligencer column:
The majority of Americans support a woman's legal right to choose. However, most Americans are unaware that one of the greatest obstacles is simply finding a doctor. There is a shortage of providers: 87 percent of U.S. counties and 98 percent of rural counties do not have a single abortion provider. Nearly a quarter of women wanting abortions have to travel 50 miles or more for the service. The difficulty in affording, finding or receiving abortion services delays almost half the women who have abortions beyond 15 weeks gestation.Abortion is one of the most common surgical procedures among U.S. women. More than 1 million women have abortions each year. Despite this medical need, doctors emerging from medical schools and residency programs are not being trained to meet the needs of their patients.
The shortage of abortion providers is startling. More than 50 percent of U.S. providers are over the age of 50. The number of Ob/Gyns performing abortions has been steadily declining over the past 20 years. Currently, a mere 2 percent of Ob/Gyns perform more than 50 percent of U.S. abortions.
Scary stuff. Any folks in the medical field want to put in their two cents?
For more info on doctors and choice, check out Physicians for Reproductive Choice and Health.
Posted by Jessica at January 23, 2006 9:15 AM
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Comments
I am a Registered Nurse residing in the state of Tennessee. I first became a pro-choice activist in 1978. After graduating from nursing school, I vowed to learn how to do suction curettage in anticipation of the day when abortion may again become illegal in the United States.
I went to work in an abortion clinic. I know how to do this procedure. I *will* do exactly what I vowed to do *when* (there is no if in this sentence any more) abortion is made illegal here in Tennessee.
It is a crime that our country is even *considering* forcible pregancy when we have the technology and the wealth to prevent this enslavement of women's bodies.
I cry out to anyone who will listen to consider making the same decision I have made. I will not stand by and watch Margaret Sanger's work come to naught. She stood for women, and I will as well.
And I won't have a paid position, benefits, or press time. What I will have is a clear conscience in knowing that I am doing my part to prevent reproductive slavery.
Posted by: TNMom at January 26, 2006 12:11 AM