Pro-(Controlling Your) Life

What does it mean to be pro-life? The "momScore" may shed some light.

In honor of Mother’s Day, Revolution Health has developed this useful interactive map that gives all 50 states a "momScore" designed, according to the site to:

"…compare and evaluate maternal and early childhood health across the United States."

To determine the scores, researchers evaluated a variety of factors including: access to prenatal care, maternal mortality, availability of child care services, risk of pregnancy complications, affordability of children’s health insurance and more.

And what did researchers uncover?

Well, you’ll need to head over to the site to figure out how your state rates but one cat I can let out of the bag is this: states like Louisiana and Mississippi were at the bottom of the barrel. In essence, both states (among a handful of others) have utterly failed to adequately prioritize and care for their mothers and children. Why is that important?

Louisiana and Mississippi have received failing grades in another domain as well.

Both carry the weight of having some of the most restrictive, heinous anti-choice legislation on their books in the entire country. In Louisiana’s case, the state legislature has deemed it a higher priority to spend their resources and energy on laws that: force women to get their husband’s permission to have an abortion, ensure abortion is outlawed should Roe v. Wade be overturned, and force women to wait 24 hours and listen to a state-mandated speech by a physician after deciding to have an abortion rather than ensure that women receive high-quality pre-natal care or paid family leave.

Mississippi has an appalling record, according to momScore, when it comes to ensuring that babies who are actually born in the state remain alive, healthy and thriving. And if you’re a mother in Mississippi? You’re more likely to face the possibility of unconstitutional bans against your right not to have a child if you don’t want to rather than ensuring that the children you do have are given access to health insurance, and quality early childcare.

It’s no coincidence that those states which fail to prioritize the health and well-being of mothers and children are also those states with the most restrictions when it comes to allowing women control over their own reproduction and family planning.