Posted on 01/22/2009 2:54:18 AM PST by markomalley
As President Barack Obama gears up to tackle urgent challenges, from the economy to the Middle East, and to reverse the many failed policies of the Bush administration, he should pay special attention to those that have denied women around the world basic reproductive health care.
The United States used to lead the way in forging international agreements on women's reproductive health and rights, values that fully reflect fundamental constitutional principles. I am proud to have played a part, along with many others, in building global support for these agreements.
But three policies supported by the Bush administration have greatly eroded these rights and should be rescinded immediately. With these decisive actions, the new administration could demonstrate its commitment to policies ensuring that women can exercise their basic right to decide the number and spacing of their children.
* First, Obama can -- and likely will -- satisfy some hopes quickly, by rescinding the "Global Gag Rule," a Reagan-era regulation that prevents private organizations in poor countries from receiving U.S. family planning funding if they engage in any abortion-related activities, even with their own money.
The damage this policy has inflicted on women's health and rights is well-documented; I have heard heartbreaking stories from every region about how it has disrupted health and family planning services and failed to prevent abortions.
Having overseen implementation of President Bill Clinton's 1993 decision to reverse the same policy, I know that at best it will take months for the change to be translated into real improvements in women's lives. With tens of thousands of poor, desperate women and girls turning to unsafe back-alley abortions every day, we cannot afford to lose more time.
* Next, swift action is needed to dramatically increase U.S. funding for family planning services in poor countries -- the surest way to reduce both unintended pregnancy and abortion.
Funding for these essential services has declined steadily since 1995, despite growing demand worldwide and rapid population growth in countries that can least afford it. A broad coalition of reproductive health and rights organizations supports the findings of several research efforts that recommend a doubling of current U.S. spending on this urgent need, to at least $1 billion per year. Including this funding in the budget should be a top Obama priority.
* Third, it is equally essential is to work with Congress to end bans on U.S. funding for legal abortion care that discriminate against poor women at home and abroad. The Helms Amendment, which was attached to U.S. foreign-assistance legislation 35 years ago and remains in place, prohibits use of U.S. funds for "performance of abortions as a method of family planning." It is long past time to remove this restriction (and similar domestic funding bans, including the Hyde Amendment).
Until that happens, the United States can do much more to support provision of safe abortion care in cases of rape, incest and pregnancy that threatens a woman's life or health, including training and equipping health workers to provide safe abortion in these circumstances (legal even under current restrictions and supported by an overwhelming majority of Americans). Such assistance would help to reduce complications of unsafe abortions that now claim the lives of 67,000 women and seriously injure millions more every year.
After years in which the Bush administration's narrow ideological agenda constrained U.S. policymakers, diplomats and organizations relying on U.S. funding, Obama can count on support around the world to translate agreements on paper into real, lasting improvements in women's lives. He faces many urgent issues, but few are more critical or touch more people than the need to ensure that the world's sisters, daughters, mothers and wives all enjoy basic reproductive health and rights.
(Elizabeth Maguire was director of the U.S. government's international family planning assistance program from 1993 to 1999 and is now president and CEO of Ipas, an international private organization based in Chapel Hill.)
I think I'm going to be ill.
How the heck is it my responsibility to pay for abortions (or innoculations, or food or anything else) for someone else, especially in foreign countries?
It's, uh, interesting to note the cunning use of language that the 'borts use to describe their bloody business.
DuncanWaring: “How the heck is it my responsibility to pay for abortions (or innoculations, or food or anything else) for someone else, especially in foreign countries?”
Don’t you watch the news? There was a vote, and 52 million of your fellow citizens voted to take away your liberty.
It’s critical to the Left that we export our American imperialists ideas and practices of killing human beings.
I’m less-than-fully pleased with that particular turn of events.
Your opposition is duly noted but irrelevant. Those people who want government to fund their abortions with your hard-earned money have spoken. Now pay up!
Newspeak at its finest.
Indeed. This single-digit IQ commie crap is “journalism”? Spew.
Newspeak for U.S. taxpayer funded worldwide abortion on demand. A “brave new world” is truly upon us.
Euphemism is the foundation of liberalism.
Without it, liberalism could not exist in its modern form.
Chopping up an unborn baby and sucking the chunks down a tube == care
The first thing that the government will do is to severely limit malpractice lawsuits. The lawyers will not like this.
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