Texas Republicans have promised not to further decimate women’s health care in the state, and it’s being hailed as a compromise. I think it’s more like a hostage situation.
Citing new research showing that Texas’ increased restrictions on abortion are negatively affecting women, family planning clinics, and abortion providers in the state, Rep. Jessica Farrar will file a bill this week to overturn the forced 24-hour waiting period.
The federal government may be moving forward with the birth control benefit, but the real action in reproductive rights remains in the states.
Documents released to RH Reality Check show that the Texas Department of State Health Services ignored the input of hundreds of Texans asking it to reconsider or revise new abortion reporting requirements, and instead bent to the will of one anti-choice lawmaker and a handful of his colleagues.
What does a future without Roe v. Wade look like? In a lot of ways, it looks like Texas, where those who are in the least ideal financial and socio-economic position to provide for an unplanned-for child are the ones for whom abortion–and contraception–is hardest to access.
Last week, the Texas Health And Human Services Commission disabled the problem-riddled online provider search function on its Texas Women’s Health Program website, which has, for months, directed low-income women seeking pap smears to call endoscopy clinics and pediatric offices.
The Texas Health and Human Services Commission has said that it will have absolutely no trouble managing the number of clients in its new Texas Women’s Health Program, according to the department’s own survey. According to everyone else? Not so much.
As any woman knows, finding the right gynecologist is no small feat–but finding the “right” gynecologist is taking on a new meaning in Texas, where reproductive health providers must now show that their politics don’t clash with those of conservative lawmakers if they want to continue to see patients in the Texas Women’s Health Program.
The battle over the Women’s Health Program continues with thousands of women left without care as 2013 begins.
