Medical Students for Choice were and are still literally putting their futures and lives on the line by taking on the medical establishment as well as the anti-abortion zealots to bring forward new generations of abortion providers.
Cervical cancer incidence rates vividly demonstrate inequities in our health care systems and in health outcomes. Women in rural areas, the elderly, those with less formal education, and women of color, for example, experience disproportionately high rates of cervical cancer. Meanwhile, in rural communities, uninsured white women have some of the poorest access to routine screening of any patient population.
Although the clinic blockades of the 1980s and early 1990s, called "rescues" by anti-abortion activists, are fewer than they used to be thanks to 1994's Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act [FACE], the ever-present threat of violence remains a fact of life for providers.
One key reason for the success of state legislatures in restricting women's right to choose might be that the fight over abortion in the United States historically has been framed as an issue of privacy. And the right to privacy offers poor protection for what is also an issue of life, health, and—above all—discrimination.
Earlier this week, Washington Post columnist David Milbank leveled criticism at both sides of the debate over reproductive rights. He said the pro-choice crowd should “drop the sky-is-falling warnings about Roe and acknowledge that…not every compromise means a slippery slope to the back alley." Unfortunately, Milbank is being more than a little naïve.
It is no secret that women of color—specifically Black and Latina women—are at greatest risk of cervical cancer. Ending cervical cancer will be no easy task. Great strides can be made by taking a multi-level approach to the problem, which includes expanding knowledge, empowering Black women to make their health a priority, and continued advocacy efforts.
Mexico has thirty-two states if you include Mexico City’s federal district, and until the spring of 2007, when Mexico City legalized it during the first twelve weeks of gestation, abortion was illegal in all of them. It was rarely prosecuted, though, and there were also legal exemptions.
