FactChecking the Colorado Senate Race

FactChecking the Colorado Senate Race



This one takes the Senate Campaign in Colorado, Republican Cory Gardner v Mark Udall. Gardner ads come out with a lot of egg on faces.  Read it. Fact Checking.org has not been kind to Udall, but when you put it all together, Gardner ads are twisted.  www.factcheck.org

ACOG Statement on “Personhood” Measures

February 10, 2012

Washington, DC -- The American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) is unequivocally opposed to the so-called "personhood" laws or amendments being considered in several states. These measures erode women's basic rights to privacy and bodily integrity; deny women access to the full spectrum of preventive health care including contraception; and undermine the doctor-patient relationship. ACOG firmly believes that science must be at the core of public health policies and medical decision-making that affect the health and life of women.

Like Mississippi's failed "Personhood Amendment" Proposition 26, these misleading and ambiguously worded "personhood" measures substitute ideology for science and represent a grave threat to women's health and reproductive rights that, if passed, would have long-term negative outcomes for our patients, their families, and society. Although the individual wording in these proposed measures varies from state to state, they all attempt to give full legal rights to a fertilized egg by defining "personhood" from the moment of fertilization, before conception (ie, pregnancy/ implantation) has occurred. This would have wide-reaching harmful implications for the practice of medicine and on women's access to contraception, fertility treatments, pregnancy termination, and other essential medical procedures.

These "personhood" proposals, as acknowledged by proponents, would make condoms, natural family planning, and spermicides the only legally allowed forms of birth control. Thus, some of the most effective and reliable forms of contraception, such as oral contraceptives, intrauterine devices (IUDs), and other forms of FDA-approved hormonal contraceptives could be banned in states that adopt "personhood" measures. Women's very lives would be jeopardized if physicians were prohibited from terminating life-threatening ectopic and molar pregnancies. Women who experience pregnancy loss or other negative pregnancy outcomes could be prosecuted in some cases.  

So-called "personhood" measures would have a negative impact on fertility treatments, including in vitro fertilization (IVF), that allow otherwise infertile couples to achieve pregnancy and create their families. Such proposals would also invariably ban embryonic stem cell research, depriving all of society potential lifesaving therapies.

ACOG supports guaranteed access to the full array of clinical and reproductive services appropriate to each individual woman's needs throughout her life. These "personhood" measures must be defeated in the best interest of women's health.  

Who is really overreaching into women's lives? Listen up my daughters, grandaughters

Listen up my daughters and granddaughters. The ultra religious right wants to dictate how you live your lives, not just by delivering edicts from the pulpit, but from the legislature and the political podium. They want laws to carry out their religious mission whether you share their particular interpretation of the Bible or not. The result, the freedom to make choices about your lives and health care, the relationship with your doctor, the ability even to have the wherewithal and freedom to make those choices, is in jeopardy.

You have enjoyed freedom to make choices in your life time. You have taken it for granted that freedom is there for you. You have lived in the era of Roe v Wade, Griswold v Connecticut, and a majority of those governing guarding your rights. However, there are those who are determined to roll your lives back to the times of under which those who went before you lived.

No one is telling you to get an abortion or take the pill. You may never ever want to do any of this. Some just want to deny your opportunity and ability to make your own decisions about your health in consultation with your priest, rabbi or minister and/or your doctor. Some want to make it even criminal for doctors to help you make some of these decisions.

Be aware that personhood amendments that define life as beginning at conception put into the laws you must obey could make it illegal for you to get the pill, much less to take any other measures to plan your family.

I have seen you, my daughters, delay mammograms and checkups until you could afford the copays or get a job that provided health insurance. Be aware that health care reform we call Obamacare outlaws treating pregnancy as a pre -existing condition, preventing it to be used as grounds for denying insurance. Obamacare provides that mammograms, colonoscopies, checkups, and contraceptives will be provided to all without co-pays.

Your father/grandfather, an obstetrician-gynecologist,is a doctor whose ethical beliefs have been in synch with Catholic hospital policies in which he has been in attendance. He is furious with these attempts to interfere with his relationships with his patients by restricting his ability to advise what he believes is best to make sure the mothers and the babies he delivers are healthy in mind, body and spirit. The last straw this past month came when it became obvious that there were those who wanted to keep you from getting or affording contraceptives. A purpose of such medication is to help you avoid undertaking even more emotionally and physically painful procedures in the future, including treatment for endometriosis.

Do not fall for the line that health reform legislation is just a big federal government overreach. The most radical overreaches are those laws that restrict your personal choices and are being enacted at the state level, while the Republican dominated House of Representatives echoes some of the same legislative initiatives. Remember, who will be elected President could appoint justices that overturn Roe v Wade. Feed this in your voting decisions , or else in 2013 you may be in for a rude shock.