Last week was a not a great week for women:
Iowa voted to ban all abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected (6 weeks), except in cases of rape, incest or medical emergency.
Mn House voted to allow employers to deny coverage for birth control as part of the Health & Human Services (& Transportation) Omnibus bill and they also voted against the Protect Access to Contraception (PAC) Act that would have protected no-cost birth control from further attack from the Administration.
Lastly the Mn Senate passed SF2849, the “ultrasound bill”, legislating that doctors must offer patients, who have chosen to have an abortion, the option of viewing an ultrasound (a right patients already have). This bill interferes with the doctor/patient relationship and aims to shame patients by implying they have not considered all the medical information before making their decision to terminate their pregnancy.
This bill is being voted on in the MN House today, Thursday May 10th. Planned Parenthood MN, NARAL Prochoice Minnesota and other groups will be gathering at the Capitol this morning to send a loud and clear message to the Representatives about how we feel about this bill and how we expect them to vote.
Call, email or tweet your Representative this morning to let them know your opinion of this bill. And once there is a vote, we will update the status of the bill here on the WMM website and it may be time to contact the Governor to ask him to veto it.