What will you do without birth control?

Your birth control method may not be available to you under a new “rule” for the Department of Health and Human Services (HSS), (a rule — that congress and the courts cannot stop) which the Bush Administration is working to ratify. A rule that would broaden the definition of abortion to include most birth control methods and could render them illegal — or impossible to obtain — especially for women under the age of 18.

Other changes in HSS policy include making “refusal clauses” legal policy. These “clauses” allow pharmacists and other medical persons to refuse to fill your prescription for medications that go against their religious beliefs — like regular birth control and emergency contraception (for you and rape victims). You could be denied an abortion if you go to a medical center where someone works who doesn’t believe in them and refuses to perform them or refer to you another clinic.

Planned Parenthood and other federally funded health centers could not refuse to hire these religious extremist because of their beliefs. How would you like to try to get medically accurate information from the nurse that protests against birth control outside our Kalamazoo health center? Under this new rule, that could happen. Misinformation and anti-abortion tactics will become intertwined with medical facts.

Do these possibilities scare you? They should, because they are dangerously close to becoming the reality in women’s health care in this country.

Do something! Write a letter to the editor to help inform others about what you’ve learned. Write to the president demanding that he keep theology out of medicine. Write, call, speak out to everyone about this outrageous attempt to put women back in the kitchen barefoot and pregnant!

For more details, check out some of the articles that have been written about this issue. Then, Stand up! Speak Out! And vote!

The Oregonian: Wyden urges feds to reconsider contraception policy

The Seattle Times: An anti-abortion ploy

Chicago Sun-Times: Stealth attack on women's rights exposed

The New York Times: Redefining Abortion