House Bill 15, effective Sept. 1 of this year, features a host of requirements for women considering having an abortion.
The bill requires doctors to disclose the risks associated with both having an abortion and carrying the child to term, legal rights regarding paternal support, abortion alternatives, where to find more information and other necessary, helpful information.
Women must sign a document certifying her knowledge of the risks and options involved, just as patients receiving anesthesia are informed of risks associated with the drugs — it’s standard protocol.
The recently added sonogram requirement, however, contradicts traditional Republican viewpoints. HB 15 specifies what a doctor must do and say during the sonogram procedure, as well as when and how he must perform it. The Texas Medical Association has voiced concerns over the legislature’s mandate; the bill includes disciplinary action by a board of directors, and it takes away their discretion as well.
The modified bill that Gov. Rick Perry signed into law changed the requirement of discipline from “may” to “shall.” This makes discipline, regardless of the circumstances, mandatory.
Physicians that fail to perform sonograms exactly in the stipulated manner face license revocation and shall not have their license renewed. So, doctors are punished for making medical decisions — apparently the Texas legislature must know better.
Perry has a bachelor’s degree in animal science from Texas A&M, and most members of the legislature are businessmen, politicians and lawyers. How is this group qualified to make this decision?
The party cherishes the sacred doctor/patient relationship and patients’ rights of choice. They used that argument to oppose Obama’s health care legislation. In this case, however, these rules do not apply. According to Republicans, health care regulations are evil when trying to reducing inequality, but fine when pushing Christian moral agendas.
Economic consequences reveal the same hypocrisy. Republicans are enamored with privatization and are convinced that efficiency and doing more with less are vital to a thriving economy. So why force something that may or may not be necessary based on an individual’s health? If a licensed physician does not deem a service necessary, performing the service is nothing but a waste of the physician’s time and the patient’s money. Is this the efficiency that Republicans champion?
The cost of a sonogram can discourage poorer patients from having an abortion. And insurance plans often refuse to pay for services that are not medically necessary, so even patients lucky enough to have insurance could have to pay for an extra, unnecessary service.
What about patients without insurance? The Texas legislature is in the process of cutting medical care for the poor and has already cut much funding from Planned Parenthood and other institutions that provide free reproductive services, such as sonograms, to women. Is this not economic discrimination?
If the Texas legislature forces people to make certain choices regardless of economic realities, it should step up and foot the bill. And, the next time Republicans gloat about protecting individual rights and economic efficiency, consider how their actions fail to conform to their rhetoric.
It's fine to be pro-choice (not really). I think that the pro-choicers should be gratified that Republicans have given up trying to save the lives of unborn children and are now only trying to empower mothers to make the right choice.
Given the societal pressure to murder children through abortion (which is quite oppressive – think of the taboos of unwed mothers, teen pregnancy, having children on welfare, etc), it's not entirely without merit that someone should set up a counter-potential to support those who would otherwise would cave to that pressure. As progressives have long noted when commenting on the political decision to go to war, it's much harder to execute a child when you must 'look it in the face.'
This does nothing to restrict the rights of women to murder unborn children (which occurs with no oversight from the government) – it only serves to ensure they they consider the entire situation. I don't think that, when a child's life is at stake, that is totally inappropriate.
For what it's worth, the Republican platform is predicated on giving a person the freedom to make their own choices. This law nicely protects the freedom of the mother to murder the child in her womb, while at the same time giving a head fake toward protecting the rights of the child to be alive.
I think you're missing the point. Sure it "serves to consider the entire situation," but at whose expense? Like mentioned in the article, insurance companies often do not cover the costs of extra services. A $300 sonogram may mean nothing to some, but to many the cost discourages patients to follow through with an abortion. If Republicans truly want to "empower mothers to make the 'right' choice," they should stop implementing unnecessary and costly requirements such as these and let mothers decide what's right on their own.
"I think you're missing the point. Sure it "serves to consider the entire situation," but at whose expense? Like mentioned in the article, insurance companies often do not cover the costs of extra services. A $300 sonogram may mean nothing to some, but to many the cost discourages patients to follow through with an abortion."
I'll never understand how progressives think that "a child is too expensive" is justification to murder it. If only they felt that way about Social Security and Medicare, we would have the best finances of any developed country.
"If Republicans truly want to "empower mothers to make the 'right' choice," they should stop implementing unnecessary and costly requirements such as these and let mothers decide what's right on their own."
When you buy a gun, progressives want people to wait for a minimum of three days (or ideally, be denied access altogether). And a gun doesn't, by necessity, end up with a homicide. Abortion *always* ends in death. Making it a little bit more expensive is not immoral, especially when it's already subsidized by taxpayers.