Texas bans abortion.

[xjx388]

Do you have something other than a bald assertion? Should we take your word for it or the word of experts?

I'm referring to the fact that there have never been abortion clinics in rural Texas. Women have always had to travel to urban areas. There simply isn't enough business to keep such clinics open.

For the record, the Rio Grande Valley (Its where I live and seems to be the subject of many stories about "rural" Texas) is not rural. There are plenty of hospitals nearby and there is no reason that abortion clinics couldn't meet the requirements. If the owners of those clinics choose not to invest in the relatively minor upgrades to meet the law, then there must be good economic reasons for that. Not to mention the social reasons here in a heavily Catholic community. What if most people simply don't want abortions here?

 

[newyorkguy]

<snip> If the owners of those clinics choose not to invest in the relatively minor upgrades to meet the law, then there must be good economic reasons for that.

Great, I've been wondering about this. You said it, you get to define it. What are the upgrades and what's a ballpark figure on what they'd cost?

What if most people simply don't want abortions here?

If most people in your area don't want abortions then they don't have to have abortions. (Btw polling suggests that statewide about 55% of Texans have no problem with abortion.) I don't want to own a handgun but I'm not insisting that therefore no one should have one.

What if most people simply don't want other people to have abortions here?

FTFY.

 

[RandFan]

I'm referring to the fact that there have never been abortion clinics in rural Texas. Women have always had to travel to urban areas.

Let's back up. You said:

This changes absolutely nothing for rural Texans.

Following your logic then it would follow that all abortion clinics are equidistant to every home in rural Texas? Are you sure about that?

What if most people simply don't want abortions here?

I would suggest that they don't have abortions. *What does the majority have to do with the right of a woman to have an abortion?

*Roe v. Wade decision held that women have a right to choose to have an abortion during the first two trimesters of a pregnancy.

 

[newyorkguy]

With the forum on short time I'm going to just skip to the chase. This changes absolutely nothing for rural Texans? I'm not sure that is really accurate. Besides the fact the seven clinics still open are supposedly concentrated in a couple of urban areas, I found this published on The Prospect last March:

Since November [2013], the last abortion clinics in East Texas and the Rio Grande Valley, some of the poorest and most remote parts of the state, have been hanging on by their fingernails. The two clinics, both outposts of a network of abortion providers called Whole Woman’s Health, stayed open with slimmed-down staffs while their owner, Amy Hagstrom Miller, struggled to comply with the first chunk of HB2—the voluminous anti-choice law passed by the Texas legislature last summer—which requires abortion doctors to obtain admitting privileges at a local hospital. Today, after weeks of failed negotiations with nearby hospitals, Hagstrom Miller announced that both clinics are closing their doors. The clinics in Beaumont, about an hour east of Houston, and McAllen, just north of the Mexico border in the Rio Grande Valley, were the last rural abortion providers left in Texas. Link

I'm suspicious especially that apparently one of the new requirements is obtaining admitting privileges at area hospitals. Providing abortion services are not popular. Many hospitals refuse to do it, not on medical grounds, but on political grounds. Especially in conservative areas where performing abortions may cost the hospital the support of local political leaders. That's a powerful reason for hospitals to say, "Thanks but no thanks," to abortion clinics when they come looking for affiliation.

 

[RandFan]

I'm referring to the fact that there have never been abortion clinics in rural Texas.

BTW: The fact that I live in a rural part of California doesn't make me an expert on every rural community in California.

Texas = 268,820 sq miles

 

[Corsair 115]

Texas = 268,820 sq miles

Puny! Ontario = 415,598 sq miles.

 

[Kestrel]

I'm suspicious especially that apparently one of the new requirements is obtaining admitting privileges at area hospitals. Providing abortion services are not popular. Many hospitals refuse to do it, not on medical grounds, but on political grounds. Especially in conservative areas where performing abortions may cost the hospital the support of local political leaders. That's a powerful reason for hospitals to say, "Thanks but no thanks," to abortion clinics when they come looking for affiliation.

During the Jim Crow era, admission privilege requirements were used to keep black physicians from opening clinics.

 

[RandFan]

Puny! Ontario = 415,598 sq miles.

Touche.

 

[thaiboxerken]

I'm guessing legal.

ETA: I think the best way to deal with these Texas laws on abortion clinics is to donate a bunch of money to outfits like Planned Parenthood so that they can pay for the upgrades now required by the law.

That would only work for a short period of time, as then the legislators would write another law requiring even more. They effectively banned abortion in other states this way.

 

[Sherman Bay]

What if Diane Feinstein proposed changes in the way firearm dealers are regulated. But it turned out the immediate effect of the new law would be to require about 80% of the dealers to shut down. If posters then wrote, "I support the new law, not because I'm pro gun control but because I want safe gun dealers," would that seem credible?

Silly boy. Everyone knows that no gun dealers would be the safest ones.

Then we could buy guns only on the black market, where they are safest of all.

Kinda like a parallel with the former (and future) black market for abortions, eh?

 

[Sherman Bay]

Do you have any citations from experts that these clinics posed a significant risk to women?

Yeah, the way the law was written, you'd think women were dropping like flies and bodies were piling up in the hallways. We must put a stop to this scourge!

 

[thaiboxerken]

The problem with asking for evidence of the conservatives assertions is that.... lies don't usually have supportive evidence.

 

[newyorkguy]

Now where were we... Oh yeah.

There have been some problems with clinics, I'm not aware of whether there are or aren't any documented bad ones in Texas. One of the factors blamed for this is, sad to say, the political extremism and the violence have convinced many doctors and medical providers that it's a good business to stay away from. Thus some pretty sleazy characters have entered the field.

But the answer is not to pass laws that make it hard for clinics to stay open. The answer is to enforce existing standards and do more inspections. But I think realistically this Texas legislation is part of an effort to eventually drive abortion clinics out of the state.

 

[tsig]

The arguments giving vague, handwaving support to the law in this thread are almost as disingenuous as the arguments the state's lawyers are putting forth.
150 miles is a very long way for anyone without a solid car and/or without the ability to take time off work (assuming they have a job in the first place). Hell, it's been years since I went more than 100 miles away from my home.

Besides, one would think Republicans would line up against this law. It's unnecessary government regulation and it's anti-business.

The right not to sell a cake is ever so much more important than the right not to have a baby so you can understand Republican priorities.

 

[tsig]

You ain't from Texas, are ya?

It seems that most Texans are OK with this. Further, abortions have long been hard to obtain in rural areas for a variety of economic and social reasons. This changes absolutely nothing for rural Texans.

I see, the rural poor always have had it rough so a little bit rougher won't hurt?

Argumentum ad Screwum.

 

[Puppycow]

Seems like Roe v. Wade is dying the death of a thousand cuts. While abortion is still legal, it's getting harder and harder to actually get one.

There's also this new law in Alabama:

New Alabama Law Puts Teens Who Need Abortions on Trial. That's Dangerous and Cruel.

Picture this: You are 17 years old, in your senior year of high school, and you've just learned you're pregnant. You'd like to be able to turn to your parents for support but you know you can't. After all, they kicked your older sister out of the house when she got pregnant. But you have discussed your options with your aunt and a trusted counselor and decided to have an abortion.

You call a women's health center to make an appointment and are told that unless you get your parent's consent, you will have to go to court and essentially be put on trial in order to get the care you need.

That's right. Instead of a doctor, you get a trial.

Thanks to a new Alabama law, a teen who can't get a parent's consent has to undergo a gauntlet of questioning to get the abortion she needs. Because of this law, a prosecutor and a representative for the fetus, both of whom are charged with protecting the "state's interest in fetal life," (a.k.a. making sure the teen doesn't get an abortion), will cross-examine her.

That isn't even the half of it. In their quest to ensure that the teen can't get an abortion, the new law allows the prosecutor and fetus's representative to tell other people in the young woman's life -- including her teachers, pastor, employer, relatives, and friends – that she is pregnant. And to haul them in to court to testify against her.

No, I am not kidding.

 

[Unabogie]

Seems like Roe v. Wade is dying the death of a thousand cuts. While abortion is still legal, it's getting harder and harder to actually get one.

There's also this new law in Alabama:

New Alabama Law Puts Teens Who Need Abortions on Trial. That's Dangerous and Cruel.

Sounds like a government takeover of healthcare.

 

[Darth Rotor]

Sounds like a government takeover of healthcare.

Sounds more like government interference in health care, for non health reasons.

 

[Unabogie]

Sounds more like government interference in health care, for non health reasons.

But irresponsible hyperbole seemed to work so well in demonizing the ACA.

 

[newyorkguy]

The reality is, the part of the Texas law that's closing down abortion clinics is the requirement they affiliate with a local hospital and gain admitting privileges. That is a tough hurdle. This is from the Washington Post:

A doctor at the sole clinic in Mississippi, for instance, said his staff reached out to 13 hospitals to try to comply with their law [requiring affiliation]. Six did not respond to their inquiries, and the rest informed them he would not qualify, he said. Link

In some cases hospitals have refused to grant admitting privileges because the doctor lived too far from the hospital. Or because the clinic doctor would not agree to provisions guaranteeing the hospital that a minimum number of patients would be referred for admitting.


Antiabortion advocates say that if clinics are shutting down it's because they cannot meet basic safety standards.

Requiring admitting privileges ensures that abortion doctors are vetted by their peers and prevents abortion doctors from simply abandoning their patients in trouble at the emergency room. “The need for admitting privileges requirements is clear,” Denise Burke, vice president of legal affairs at Americans United for Life, said in an e-mail.

But it's not clear. Anyone can be admitted to an emergency room. A procedure to "ensure abortion doctors are qualified" should not depend on the clinics being able to gain admitting privileges at a local hospital. It should be a separate procedure.

How do doctors explain the difficulty abortion clinics encounter in acquiring admitting privileges at a hospital?

Doctors say the hospitals have been hesitant to extend privileges because of a reluctance to involve themselves in the abortion debate, advocates argue. For example, one Dallas hospital revoked the admitting privileges of two abortion doctors after it became a target of antiabortion protests.