Pennsylvania State Representative Kathy Rapp has introduced a bill euphemistically named “the Woman’s Right to Know”. How good can that be? Now there is an effort to make sure woman know what’s going on. Pennsylvania must be a “severely” well meaning State.
Not.
Instead Pennsylvania is poised to follow Virginia into the inexplicable land of trying to hinder a woman’s right to choose while not offering any support for either the mother to be or the unborn. Like Virginia, Pennsylvania’s bill would require a vaginal ultrasound probe if the abortion were to be scheduled within the first 7 weeks. The bill does not specify a vaginal image but at that stage of fetus development, the belly approach does not normally yield a clear enough image.
So why has it becomes necessary for another State legislature to produce a totally unnecessary and intrusive bill whose only victim is the woman. The woman and her doctor have confirmed she is pregnant. For her personal reasons, the woman has decided it is an unwanted pregnancy. She has all the information she needs. Plain and simple.
You have to wonder what these anti-abortionists do all day? There are no national directives driving women to terminate a pregnancy. Unlike China, the US has no “one child” policy.
It would certainly be ok for these anti-abortionists to come forward and offer to pay for medical care and delivery costs for any woman considering considering terminating the pregnancy. It would certainly be ok for anti-abortionists to arrange adoption and health care for any child, regardless of medical condition, to be born instead of being aborted. But they do not step forward.
Another puzzling aspect of these ultrasound bills is why are these new requirements really needed? The number of abortions per 1000 woman nationally has been decreasing since the 1990s. Additionally puzzling is why, in the minds of those who propose this type of legislation, do they not seek to prosecute the male who has inseminated the woman? Why is this a woman problem?
There is no denying this is a complicated problem. There ought to be agreement that an unwanted pregnancy is not a desired outcome. Focus ought to be on how to reduce or eliminate unwanted pregnancies. Where are the bills in Virginia or Pennsylvania that promote sex education, birth control, and family planning?