Mississippi Could Lose Its Only Abortion Clinic

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http://motherjones.com/mojo/2012/04/mississippi-could-lose-its-only-abortion-clinic

Last year, Kansas narrowly avoided becoming the first "abortion-free" state. That title might soon go to Mississippi, thanks to a bill that would require clinic doctors to obtain official admitting privileges at a local hospital before they can perform abortions—a standard that many believe was custom-designed to foil the state's only abortion clinic.

Proponents of the bill, which was sent to the Governor's desk by the state Senate yesterday, claim they're just trying to protect women's health by ensuring that if a complication occurs after an abortion, doctors can admit the patient to a hospital. While all the physicians at the Jackson Women's Health Organization in Jackson, Miss. are certified OB-GYNs—another of the bill's requirements—only one of its doctors currently has admitting privileges to a nearby hospital. Instead, in the rare case of complications, the clinic has a patient-transfer agreement with a local hospital to ensure that women can be treated there.

Admitting privileges are usually only granted to in-state doctors who will provide the hospital with a certain number of patients per month. The clinic's owner, Diane Derzis, told the Associated Press that most of the clinic's doctors commute to Jackson from out of state because "they are routinely threatened and stalked for their work." And as Derzis explained to Jezebel, "We do not have enough problems to admit that many patients." Overall, Derzis isn't optimistic that any of the three hospitals in the area—two of which are religiously-affiliated—will grant the privileges to her staff and has promised to argue the law in court if her clinic can't secure them.

As MoJo's Kate Sheppard has reported, onerous clinic regulations like these, known by abortion-rights supporters as "targeted regulation of abortion providers" or "TRAP" laws, are a favorite new tactic of abortion foes. According to the Guttmacher Institute, at least eight other states require abortion providers to have hospital admitting privileges. Mississippi would be the first state to impose an OB/GYN requirement on abortion providers.





*** if they can -- & they are -- drive reproductive health care for women out city by city, county by county, state by state -- then they don't need to over turn roe v wade.

[The Blue Flower]

1. We'll have to take the long view

If this is going to happen and no one can stop it, then let's look at the long term consequences of women losing their rights and access to care. When this is no longer a political issue because the bad guys got their way, what do they (the bad guys) have to stand (or run) on? Nothing like a hard dose of reality to educate an ignorant person. The women of the state will suffer, but then they may well organize against the party of NO. It is, after all, a local issue, and the citizens of the state have the power to change things if they have the will.

But I do hope this doesn't pass.

[Initech]

2. They'll never overturn Roe v. Wade - it's the lifeblood that drives their insanity.