Virginia Bill Would Halt Medicaid Funding For Abortions Of Fetuses That Have ‘No Chance Of Survival

[maddezmom]

Virginia Bill Would Halt Medicaid Funding For Abortions Of Fetuses That Have ‘No Chance Of Survival After Delivery’

By Amanda Peterson Beadle on Feb 17, 2012 at 1:20 pm


Virginia Del. Mark Cole (R) is sponsoring a bill that would eliminate Medicaid funding for abortions.
The Virginia General Assembly has already passed a bill that requires women to undergo an extremely invasive ultrasound before having an abortion, and a bill that would give full rights to a fetus has cleared the House of Delegates and is waiting for Senate approval.

Now, legislators are continuing their assault on women’s access to abortion with HB 62, a measure that would prevent Medicaid from covering abortions for low-income women when a doctor finds that the fetus “would be born with a gross and totally incapacitating physical deformity or mental deficiency.” A Senate committee approved the House bill Thursday, sending it to the full chamber. The House already passed the bill.

The bill’s sponsor Del. Mark Cole (R) dismissed criticism that the policy could force the state’s poorest women to give birth to mortally deformed fetuses that have no chance of survival after delivery, arguing that religious people shouldn’t have to fund abortions:

more: http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/02/17/428062/virginia-bill-would-halt-medicaid-funding-for-abortions-of-fetuses-that-have-no-chance-of-survival-after-delivery/?mobile=nc

[rfranklin]

1. Of course they will have to fund millions in futile medical care for the babies...

Because doctors and nurses can't kill a baby just because it has little chance of surviving.

These people are are authoritarian thugs and that is no exaggeration. Read this passage from the newspaper of the Nazi party:

The preservation of the family with many children is a matter of biological concept and national feeling. The family with many children must be preserved ... because it is a highly valuable, indispensable part of the ... nation. Valuable and indispensable not only because it alone guarantees the maintenance of the population in the future but because it is the strongest basis of national morality and national culture ... The preservation of this family form is a necessity of national and cultural politics ... This concept is strictly at variance with the demands for an abolition of paragraph 218; it considers unborn life as sacrosanct. For the legalization of abortion is at variance with the function of the family, which is to produce children and would lead to the definite destruction of the family with many children.

So wrote the Völkischer Beobachter of October 14, 1931.

[kdmorris]

2. How horrifying

If an ultrasound reveals deformities incompatible with life (hydrocephaly comes to mind) at the anatomy scan at 20 weeks, then in addition to dealing with the crushing news of the deformity, women would have to wait another 20 weeks carrying a fetus that they know they will give birth to just to watch him/her die.

I think, were I forced to carry a child in that situation, I would go mad during those 20 weeks... mad with grief, mad with anger and by the time that fetus was delivered... they would just have to commit me at the same time. Talk about turning something that is supposed to be a happy time into something that is nightmare.

[madrchsod]

5. i worked with someone who`s wife had a fetus that was dead

they had to wait almost a month before it was legal/insurance to have the fetus removed. i knew my friend was in agony everyday he came to work......

god i hate those who think they can decide what is best for a husband and wife.

[kdmorris]

6. My heart goes out to him and his family

That must have been an incredibly difficult time for them.

[MH1]

3. F*** these scumbags to hell and back. With a pitchfork.

I am beginning to despise republicans with all my soul. I don't know how any decent person can even call themselves a republican any more. Ok I've been wondering about that for awhile, but it just keeps getting worse ... at an accelerating pace.

[Starry Messenger]

4. Pardon my French, but what the fuck got in the water this month?

It's like an all out assault on human dignity, when things in this country couldn't be at a lower point for poor people, minorities and women (and all the overlap that occurs there).

[dana_b]

7. cruel and sick

these bastards in the legislature have no moral standing to judge these women who are going through some of the most difficult moments of their lives. We all have to keep the pressure on these people although to be honest, I don't know if they give a damn. The legislature in OK sure didn't.

[Irishonly]

8. This is vile and cruel

I am outraged. The man is hateful and cruel. I am not able to put what I think into words

[ohheckyeah]

9. I shouldn't have to fund wars,

but I do. I shouldn't have to fund lots of things I have a moral objection to, but I do.

God, it's so embarrassing living in Virginia right now.

I wrote my state representatives a scathing email - not that it will do any good.