Reproductive Rights Prof Blog

Planned Parenthood's Cecile Richards Addresses Democratic National Convention

Austin American-Statesman: Twenty years after her mother's star turn, Cecile Richards speaks to Democrats, by W. Gardner Selby:

DENVER — Twenty years after her mother wowed the Democratic National Convention in Atlanta, Cecile Richards took a lighter star turn Tuesday at the 2008 convention.

Richards, who is the president of Planned Parenthood, lacked the late Gov. Ann Richards' memorable drawl, and she didn't try to match her mother's taut wit — though the convention's speechwriting team gave her a joke referring to President Bush....

She cast Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, as an enemy of women's health care. She said he's voted 125 times on the wrong side of health issues, including votes against family planning funding and comprehensive sex education.

Bush Admin. Proposes Onerous Funding Restrictions That Would Protect Religious Refusals by Health Care Providers

Wash. Post: Protections Set for Antiabortion Health Workers, by Rob Stein:

The Bush administration yesterday announced plans to implement a controversial regulation designed to protect doctors, nurses and other health-care workers who object to abortion from being forced to deliver services that violate their personal beliefs.

The rule empowers federal health officials to pull funding from more than 584,000 hospitals, clinics, health plans, doctors' offices and other entities if they do not accommodate employees who refuse to participate in care they find objectionable on personal, moral or religious grounds....

The proposed regulation, which could go into effect after a 30-day comment period, was welcomed by conservative groups, abortion opponents and others as necessary to safeguard workers from being fired, disciplined or penalized in other ways. Women's health advocates, family planning advocates, abortion rights activists and others, however, condemned the regulation, saying it could create sweeping obstacles to a variety of health services, including abortion, family planning, end-of-life care and possibly a wide range of scientific research.

Bush Administration Appears to Back off of Controversial HHS Regs

Reuters: HHS chief denies new rule to attack contraception, by Maggie Fox:

A widely circulated draft U.S. regulation that would define many forms of contraception as abortion will not be proposed in that form, if at all, Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt said on Thursday.    

He said the draft, which was denounced by family planning groups, was circulated before he had seen it and would be rewritten....

The proposed regulation as written would have cut off federal funds to hospitals and states that attempt to compel medical providers to offer legal abortion and contraception services to women.

But see: Birth control: is administration backing down -- or not? (Countdown to Crawford blog (LA Times))

The Right-Wing Attack on Contraception

Science Progress: Contraception Is the New Abortion: The Latest Right Wing Trend? Attack Birth Control, by Jessica Arons (7/28):

The Bush administration has taken its latest swipe at contraception, but again under the pretense of opposing abortion. By manipulating scientific facts, the Department of Health and Human Services hopes to enshrine in federal law a conservative, ideological interpretation of pregnancy that has the potential to significantly limit women’s access to contraception.

...This is just the most recent attempt in a longstanding campaign by social conservatives to turn discomfort with abortion into opposition to contraception. Instead of being upfront about their genuine, but unpopular, position that contraception is morally wrong, right wing groups have tried to confuse people into thinking that the most common forms of birth control used by women actually cause abortion.

More on Proposed Bush Admin. Reg Defining Birth Control Pill as Abortion

Wall St. Journal: Treating the Pill as Abortion,  Draft Regulation Stirs Debate, by Stephanie Simon:

Set aside the fraught question of when human life begins. The new debate: When does pregnancy begin?

The Bush Administration has ignited a furor with a proposed definition of pregnancy that has the effect of classifying some of the most widely used methods of contraception as abortion.

A draft regulation, still being revised and debated, treats most birth-control pills and intrauterine devices as abortion because they can work by preventing fertilized eggs from implanting in the uterus. The regulation considers that destroying "the life of a human being."

Bush Administration's Proposed Regs Threaten Access to Birth Control

US News & World Report: A Government Threat to Birth Control, by Deborah Kotz:

A new set of health laws that could be proposed by the government sometime in the next few weeks has women's health activists steaming. If the laws are implemented, they claim, women will have a harder time getting access to contraception.

The legislation, a draft of which was leaked last week to the New York Times, stokes the debate over when human life begins by taking the position that birth control that prevents the implantation of a fertilized egg actually results in abortion. It would prohibit federally funded medical facilities—including teaching hospitals and Planned Parenthood clinics—from refusing to hire doctors who don't want to dispense birth control pills and other types of contraception that may cause the expulsion of a fertilized egg. (It's already illegal to discriminate against doctors who refuse to perform abortions.) The new laws would also override state laws that require hospitals to offer emergency contraception to rape victims and those that require employers to provide contraceptives along with other prescriptions.

See also: The Seattle Times: An Anti-Abortion Ploy.

Clinton Condemns Bush Adminstration Proposal To Define Contraception as Abortion

Reuters: Clinton vows to fight "insulting" abortion plan, by Michelle Nichols:

A Bush administration plan to define several widely used contraception methods as abortion is a "gratuitous, unnecessary insult" to women and faces tough opposition, Sen. Hillary Clinton said on Friday.    

The former Democratic presidential candidate joined family planning groups to condemn the proposal that defines abortion to include contraception such as birth control pills and intrauterine devices.

Bush Proposal to Redefine Abortion as Contraception Incites Uproar

ABC News: Bush Proposal to Change Abortion Definition, by Matthew Jaffe:

Congressional Democrats are criticizing the Bush administration for a draft proposal they say would change the definition of abortion and limit women's access to contraception.

The draft proposal from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which began circulating around Capitol Hill earlier this week, would withhold government funds from health-care providers and organizations that don't hire people who refuse to perform abortions or provide certain types of birth control.

It immediately incited an uproar from leading Democratic lawmakers, including Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y.

Sens. Clinton and Patty Murray, D-Wash., warned in a letter to HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt that the proposal has the "potential to affect millions of women's reproductive health."

"One of the most troubling aspects of the proposed rules is the overly-broad definition of 'abortion,'" write Clinton and Murray. "This definition would allow health-care corporations or individuals to classify many common forms of contraception  including the birth control pill, emergency contraception and IUDs  'abortions' and therefore to refuse to provide contraception to women who need it.

See also: Bush abortion furor takes down Nancy Pelosi's website (Countdown to Crawford (LA Times), by James Gerstenzang and Johanna Neuman) and HHS Moves to Define Contraception as Abortion (Huffington Post, by Cristina Page).

FDA Proposes Drug Label Changes Related to Pregnancy

Wash. Post/HealthDay News: FDA Proposes New Drug Labels for Pregnant Women, by Steven Reinberg:

WEDNESDAY, May 28 (HealthDay News) -- U.S. health officials proposed Wednesday changes to the labels on prescription drugs that would detail potential health effects for pregnant and breast-feeding women, their fetuses or their newborns.

If enacted, the new system, proposed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, would provide doctors and pharmacists with more comprehensive information to guide them in their prescribing practices....

The proposed system would replace the current system that relies on letter designations to describe the risks of a drug when taken during pregnancy or breast-feeding. This system was deemed confusing and incomplete.

Conservative Groups Urge Reinstatement of Reagan-Era Title X Funding Restrictions

Wall St. Journal: Antiabortion Groups Push Bush on Clinics' Subsidies, by Stephanie Simon:

With time running out on the Bush administration, conservative activists are renewing a drive for regulations that would deny federal subsidies to clinics that provide abortions or counsel women about the option.

In a final push, the activists are preparing a public campaign to pressure President Bush to use his executive authority to order the change. They say they soon will present the White House with a petition signed by tens of thousands of voters and a letter endorsed by at least 70 conservative organizations, including the Family Research Council, the Eagle Forum and Concerned Women for America....

The federal government distributes about $280 million a year among thousands of clinics to subsidize the cost of birth control, cancer screening, HIV testing and other reproductive care for low-income patients. Known as Title X, the program serves five million men and women a year. By law, the money can't be used for abortion procedures.

Concerns Mount Over Contraceptive Patch

US News & World Report: Should the Birth Control Patch Be Pulled?, by Deborah Kotz:

News is looking worse and worse for the contraceptive patch made by Ortho Evra. Well-known consumer health advocate Sidney Wolfe petitioned the Food and Drug Administration yesterday to remove the patch from the market, saying that there's enough research to show that patch users have unacceptable higher risks of dangerous blood clots than those who take birth control pills. The FDA has already slapped a warning label on the patch that's been updated several times to reflect new studies finding that women who wear the patch have about double the risk of developing the clot condition called venous thromboembolism. That's most likely because the patch exposes them to 60 percent more estrogen than what they'd get if they were on a pill containing 35 micrograms of estrogen.

Associated Press: Group asks government to end use of birth-control patch:

A consumer advocacy group petitioned the government Thursday to pull the birth-control patch off the market, calling it far riskier than the pill.

"Ortho-Evra is a poor choice for women," Dr. Sidney Wolfe of Public Citizen wrote the Food and Drug Administration.

Warnings about the Ortho-Evra weekly patch have escalated since a 2005 investigation by The Associated Press found patch users suffer higher rates of life-threatening blood clots than women who take birth-control pills.

NPR on Johns Hopkins Database Fiasco and George Tiller Saga

You can listen to the following segments by clicking the links below.

Magazine Led to Database's 'Abortion' Search Block, by Brenda Wilson:

An inquiry into why the world's largest database on reproductive health blocked searches using the term "abortion" has found the restriction was put in place because of articles from an abortion advocacy magazine available on the site.

The block was an "overreaction," says Michael Klag, the dean of Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, which maintains the POPLINE database. When Klag learned that the search function for abortion had been removed, he ordered it restored. The block was taken down Friday afternoon.

Kan. Court Weighs Medical Records in Abortion Case, by Kathy Lohr:

The Kansas Supreme Court will hear oral arguments Tuesday in a case involving a Wichita doctor who performs abortions. A grand jury is seeking thousands of George Tiller's medical records in an effort to see whether he broke the law by performing illegal third-trimester abortions.

Dean of Johns Hopkins Public Health School Lifts Database Restrictions on Searches for "Abortion"

NY Times: Health Database Was Set Up to Ignore ‘Abortion’, by Robert Pear:

Johns Hopkins University said Friday that it had programmed its computers  to ignore the word “abortion” in searches of a large, publicly financed database of information on reproductive health after federal officials raised questions about two articles in the database. The dean of the Public Health School lifted the restrictions after learning of them.

See also Medical News Today: Reproductive Health Professionals Criticize Censorship Of Content Related To Abortion On USAID-Funded Database; Applaud Dean's Reversal  (statement by the Association of Reproductive Health Professionals).

U.S.-Government-Funded Website Censors Abortion Info

Wired: U.S. Funded Health Search Engine Blocks 'Abortion', by Sarah Lia Stirland:

A U.S. government-funded medical information site that bills itself as the world's largest database on reproductive health has quietly begun to block searches on the word "abortion," concealing nearly 25,000 search results.

Called Popline, the search site is run by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Maryland. It's funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, the federal office in charge of providing foreign aid, including health care funding, to developing nations....

Under a Reagan-era policy revived by President Bush in 2001, USAID denies funding to non-governmental organizations that perform abortions, or that "actively promote abortion as a method of family planning in other nations..."

"We recently made all abortion terms stop words," Dickson wrote in a note to Gloria Won, the UCSF medical center librarian making the inquiry. "As a federally funded project, we decided this was best for now."

There was no notice of the change on the site.

Pres. Bush tries to revive ban on needle-exchange programs in Wash. DC

Washington Post: What's the Point? (editorial):

Tucked into President Bush's 2009 budget proposal is the resurrection of a provision, dumped by Congress last year, that prohibits the District from using its own money to fund needle-exchange programs. This is unconscionable, especially since intravenous drug use is helping to fuel the HIV-AIDS crisis gripping the city. That Mr. Bush would do this in a budget that will take effect after he's left Washington strikes us as gratuitous and shortsighted.

The restriction was attached to the District's appropriations bill by Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.) in 1998. Mr. Bush has supported the prohibition every year of his administration. Despite plenty of evidence to the contrary, he and Mr. Tiahrt are part of the head-in-the-sand crowd that believes swapping addicts' dirty needles for clean ones encourages drug use. Never mind that there are more than 210 syringe-swapping programs in 36 states. Every attempt to excise the harmful provision failed -- until last year. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) and Rep. Jose E. Serrano (D-N.Y.) used the new Democratic majority in the House to finally strip it from legislation.

Pres. Bush's 2009 Budget Drastically Cuts Funding For International Reproductive Health Services

Via Population Action International:

President Bush's proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2009, released today, would dramatically cut funding for international family planning and sexual and reproductive health programs. The proposed funding level of $327 million represents a $134 million (or 29%) cut from current levels.

This budget proposal continues a disturbing downward trend in funding for these vital health programs for women and families. Since 1995, U.S. funding for family planning programs has fallen nearly $100 million -- a 39 percent reduction when adjusted for inflation and the FY 2009 budget request would equal a nearly 60% reduction below the amount provided for these programs in FY 1995 (adjusted for inflation). These cuts have occurred despite a growing need and demand for reproductive health care in the developing world. For example, the number of women of reproductive age in the developing world alone has increased by approximately 275 million women since 1995.

The funding reduction also coincides with President Bush continuing to withhold money from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), which might otherwise be able to help compensate for the funding shortfall. President Bush has withheld nearly $200 million from UNFPA since 2002, despite funding appropriated by the United States Congress.

RH Reality Check also addresses President Bush's decision to slash funding for family planning services abroad.

Nina Crimm on the Global Gag Rule

Nina J. Crimm (St. John's University School of Law) has published and posted The Global Gag Rule: Undermining National Interests By Doing Unto Foreign Women and NGOs What Cannot Be Done At Home, Cornell International Law Journal,Vol. 40, No. 587, 2007, on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

The Mexico City Policy, also known as the Global Gag Rule (GGR), is an executive-based foreign assistance policy that constrains USAID financial aid for family planning programs in developing countries. It has had enormous unconscionable impact on the lives of individuals and to the operations of foreign nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). The policy has compromised women's health and welfare, jeopardized children's well-being, and adversely affected victims of HIV/AIDS. It unjustly has denied women's rights to self-determination and dignity with respect to reproductive matters. The GGR also has caused NGOs to curtail programs vital to maintaining health clinics and essential to delivery of critical healthcare services. It financially has threatened the existence of some foreign NGOs, has caused the demise of others, and has precluded alliances of NGOs essential for solving public health crises. The GGR has chilled the speech and stifled expressive associations of foreign NGOs, which likely would be constitutionally impermissible with respect to domestic NGOs. The many problematic consequences of the policy have been contrary to U.S. national interests in advancing the spread and stability of political democracies, free markets, and in enhancing the health, education and economic well-being of populations in developing countries. And, as a foreign assistance policy not true to the best U.S. traditions adopted from Judeo-Christian precepts, the GGR has tainted the image of the U.S. as a model democracy. Its real, but objectionable, contribution has been only to the self-interests of several U.S. presidents. So, now the Senate and House of Representatives, with their recently installed Democratic majorities, should enact legislation to reject the GGR.

Pres. Bush Pushes "Ethical" Stem Cell Research in State of the Union Address

Reuters: Stem cells from skin a "landmark," Bush says:

Scientists who made stem cells from ordinary skin cells showed it may not be necessary to experiment on human embryos, President George W. Bush said in his State of the Union address on Monday.

Bush said his government would expand funding "for this type of ethical medical research."

Late last year three teams of scientists reported they had tricked ordinary skin cells into behaving like embryonic stem cells -- the body's ultimate master cell with the potential to produce any type of tissue or cell.

FDA May Approve New Nonsurgical Sterilization Device

Via Reuters:

A U.S. advisory panel said on Thursday that an experimental device made by Hologic Inc...to permanently sterilize women could be approved if several post-marketing studies are conducted.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration will have the final say on whether to approve the Adiana system, which uses a catheter to implant a silicone device in the fallopian tubes to prevent pregnancy.

The FDA usually accepts the advice of its advisory panels.

The only current FDA-approved nonsurgical female sterilization procedure is the Essure system made by Conceptus Inc... which uses a metal coil device implanted in the fallopian tubes.

Both systems work by stimulating scar tissue growth in the fallopian tubes, effectively blocking the tubes, and preventing sperm from reaching the egg.

I really wish we would see more options for sterilization and family planning that impose the medical burdens on the man.

 

NYT: Teenage Birth Rate Rises for First Time Since '91

Via the New York Times:

The birth rate among teenagers 15 to 19 in the United States rose 3 percent in 2006, according to a report issued Wednesday, the first such increase since 1991. The finding surprised scholars and fueled a debate about whether the Bush administration’s abstinence-only sexual education efforts are working.

The federal government spends $176 million annually on such programs. But a landmark study recently failed to demonstrate that they have any effect on delaying sexual activity among teenagers, and some studies suggest that they may actually increase pregnancy rates.

“Spending tens of million of tax dollars each year on programs that hurt our children is bad medicine and bad public policy,” said Dr. David A. Grimes, vice president of Family Health International, a nonprofit reproductive health organization based in North Carolina.

FDA Eases Access to Dangerous Acne Drug

The Associated Press reports:

Women seeking an acne medicine that can cause severe birth defects may find it a little easier to fill their prescription: The government announced some changes Wednesday designed to ease access to the troublesome drug.

A program called iPledge was designed to ensure that every user of Accutane or its generic competitors — and every doctor who prescribes it and every pharmacy that sells it — follows strict rules to make sure that women don't get pregnant while on the drug. Among those rules are month-by-month prescriptions based on passing pregnancy tests.

But last summer, the Food and Drug Administration heard evidence that iPledge hasn't ended the problem: There were 122 pregnancies in the program's first year and another 37 in the four months since. Another 19 pregnancies occurred in women who managed to get the drug despite never enrolling in iPledge.

Still, in October the FDA agreed to a few changes to the program, and announced Wednesday that iPledge is now implementing these changes....

NYT: Sex, Science and Savings

From the New York Times editorial page on Sunday:

President Bush’s veto of Congress’s main social spending bill has Democratic leaders looking for places to make trims to satisfy the president’s sudden zeal for fiscal discipline. A small, but sensible, place to begin would be to eliminate the bill’s $28 million increase for one of Mr. Bush’s signature boondoggles — abstinence-only sex education.

Federal government spending on highly restrictive abstinence-only sex education has ballooned under President Bush, while evidence of the program’s danger as a public health strategy has continued to mount.

Last April, a Congressionally mandated evaluation found that students who received abstinence instruction in elementary and middle school were just as likely to have sex in the following years as students who did not get such instruction.

      

2007 Community-Based Abstinence Education Grantees

Who is getting all that (wasted) funding for Community-Based Abstinence Education Programs?  Here is a list of the new grantees for FY2007.  In addition, SIECUS offers a publication profiling abstinence-only-until-marriage programs and their intersection with sexuality education programs in the United States.  That publication covers grantees from previous years who may still be receiving funds (but will not show up on the above list of FY2007 grantees).

H/T: Jennifer McAllister-Nevins at the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project.

Newly Appointed Acting Surgeon General Played Role in Holding Up OTC Sale of Emergency Contraception

Via Our Bodies, Our Blog:

Dr. Steven Galson, former Director of the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (the agency's drug review and approval arm), has been appointed to the position of Acting Surgeon General, and is expected to begin the post today.

Dr. Galson's selection for the post has raised concerns from reproductive health advocates, given Galson's role in the years of delay that preceded the 2006 approval of over-the-counter sales of Plan B emergency contraception. His appointment follows recent complaints about the political pressure placed on past Surgeons General to avoid raising such issues as emergency contraception and sexuality education.

G.O.P. Contenders Endorse Health Insurance Veto

Via the New York Times:

The four leading Republican presidential candidates have aligned themselves with President Bush’s veto on Wednesday of an expanded health insurance program for children, once again testing the political risk of appearing in lock step with a president who has low approval ratings and some critics of the veto within their party.

It is yet another issue — like the Iraq war, North Korea’s nuclear program and the management of the federal response to Hurricane Katrina — where the Republican contenders are treading delicately as they gauge how to position themselves with an unpopular president on contentious issues. While all four are defending the veto, some in full-throated language, the candidates are at the same time forgoing praise of Mr. Bush’s judgment on the issue or of his leadership in general.

Clinton Says She Would Shield Science From Politics

Via the New York Times:

In a stinging critique of Bush administration science policy, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York said yesterday that if she were elected president she would require agency directors to show they were protecting science research from “political pressure” and that she would lift federal limits on stem cell research....

Her remarks yesterday, at the Carnegie Institution of Washington, amounted to a spirited attack on President Bush for waging what she called a “war on science” that has allowed political appointees to shape and in some cases distort science-based federal reports.

Mrs. Clinton said she would restore the office of White House science adviser to the higher status it held in the administrations of her husband and President Bush’s father. And she said she would encourage Congress to revive its Office of Technology Assessment, an advisory group that was shut down in 1995 after Republicans in Congress withdrew its financing.

Bush Vetoes Children’s Health Bill

Via the New York Times:

President Bush vetoed the children’s health insurance bill today, as he had promised to do, setting the stage for more negotiations between the White House and Congress and sparking unusual dismay from some prominent Republicans....

The bill was approved by Congress with unusual bipartisan support, as many Republicans who side with the president on almost everything else voted to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, or Schip, from its current enrollment of about 6.6 million children to more than 10 million....

The White House has rejected as “preposterous” any suggestion that Mr. Bush does not care about the welfare of poor children. But the reaction of some Republicans as well as Democrats was so heated that at least one lawmaker who is usually allied with the president promised to try to corral votes to defeat his veto.

Bush Selects Ex-Judge as Attorney General Nominee

From the Washington Post:

President Bush today announced his nomination of retired federal judge Michael B. Mukasey to become the nation's 81st attorney general, moving to install a law-and-order conservative at the Justice Department to help wage the war on terrorism while hoping to avoid a confirmation fight with Senate Democrats.

Calling Mukasey "clear-eyed about the threat our nation faces," Bush said his nominee "knows what it takes to fight this war effectively, and he knows how to do it in a manner that's consistent with our laws and our Constitution." ...

Until the Senate votes on Mukasey, Bush said, Assistant Attorney General Peter D. Keisler will serve as acting attorney general, delaying his previously announced plan to step down on Sept. 21.

Key congressional Democrats welcomed the nomination but cautioned that Mukasey would undergo careful examination in his Senate confirmation hearing.

White House: No U.N. Funding for China

Via the Associated Press (9/7):

WASHINGTON (AP) — For the sixth consecutive year, the Bush administration has decided to withhold funding from the U.N. Population Fund, saying the agency contributes to China's "coercive abortion" program.

The administration decision was disclosed in a letter from Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte sent to lawmakers on Thursday, according to a copy of the document seen Friday. Congress had appropriated $34 million for the program, but gave President Bush the authority to decline to spend the money.

Alberto Gonzales Resigns

Via the New York Times:

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, whose tenure has been marred by controversy and accusations of perjury before Congress, announced his resignation in Washington today, declaring that he had “lived the American dream” by being able to lead the Justice Department.

Mr. Gonzales, who had rebuffed calls for his resignation for months, submitted it to President Bush by telephone on Friday, a senior administration official said. There had been rumblings over the weekend that Mr. Gonzales’s departure was imminent, although the White House sought to quell the rumors.

Mr. Gonzales appeared cheerful and composed when he announced that he was stepping down effective Sept. 17. His very worst days on the job were “better than my father’s best days,” he said, alluding to his family’s hardscrabble past.

Sales of Emergency Contraception Soar

The Associated Press reports (8/22):

In the year since it was approved for over-the-counter sales, the morning-after pill has become a huge commercial success for its manufacturer, but its popularity and solid safety record haven't deterred critics from seeking to overturn the milestone ruling.

The pill, marketed by Barr Pharmaceuticals Inc. as Plan B, was the focus of bitter debate for three years. After repeated delays, the Food and Drug Administration declared on Aug. 24, 2006 that customers 18 and older should be able to buy it in pharmacies without a prescription.

Learn more about emergency contraception (not to be confused with the early abortion pill).

Read a press statement from Planned Parenthood Federation of America.  And from the RH Reality Check Blog: Plan B: Politics Over Science.

Wash. Post: "New Bush Policies Limit Reach of Child Insurance Plan"

Via yesterday's Washington Post:

The Bush administration, engaged in a battle with Congress over whether a popular children's health insurance program should be expanded, has announced new policies that will make it harder for states to insure all but the lowest-income children.

New administrative hurdles, which state health officials were told about late last week, are aimed at preventing parents with private insurance for their children from availing of the government-subsidized State Children's Health Insurance Program. But Democrats and children's advocates said that the announcement will jeopardize coverage for children whose parents work at jobs that do not provide employer-paid insurance.

Listen to an NPR segment by Julie Rovner.

Romney Shifts on Abortion Again

On August 7, 2007, ABC News reports:

Throughout his bid for the GOP's 2008 presidential nod, Mitt Romney has called for overturning Roe v. Wade so that states can go their own way on abortion rights. Rejecting a "one-size-fits all" approach to abortion, Romney has described his position as reflecting a "federalist approach."

"My view is not to impose a single federal rule on the entire nation -- a one-size-fits all approach -- but instead allow states to make their own decisions in this regard," Romney told the National Journal in its Feb. 9 issue.

It now appears, however, that if the former Massachusetts governor succeeds in getting Roe v. Wade overturned, he would ultimately like to see two federal measures whose cumulative effect would be to curtail the ability of states from granting their residents abortion rights.

Appearing Monday on "Good Morning America," Romney was asked by ABC News' George Stephanopoulos if he supports the Republican Party's 2004 platform on abortion rights, which states, "We support a Human Life Amendment to the Constitution and we endorse legislation to make it clear that the 14th Amendment's protections apply to unborn children."

Romney replied, "You know, I do support the Republican platform, and I support that being part of the Republican platform and I'm pro-life."

NY Times: Bush Is Prepared to Veto Bill to Expand Child Insurance

Robert Pear reported in Sunday's New York Times:

The White House said on Saturday that President Bush would veto a bipartisan plan to expand the Children’s Health Insurance Program, drafted over the last six months by senior members of the Senate Finance Committee.

The vow puts Mr. Bush at odds with the Democratic majority in Congress, with a substantial number of Republican lawmakers and with many governors of both parties, who want to expand the popular program to cover some of the nation’s eight million uninsured children....

The program, which insured 7.4 million people at some time in the last year, is set to expire Sept. 30.  The Finance Committee is expected to approve the Senate plan next week, sending it to the full Senate for action later this month.

Senator Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat who is chairman of the committee, said he would move ahead despite the veto threat.

Nominee for Surgeon General Testifies in Senate

The New York Times reported on Thursday:

President Bush’s nominee for surgeon general told a Senate panel on Thursday that he would resign if asked to put politics over science on an important issue after his predecessor said he had been handcuffed by politics.  The nominee, Dr. James W. Holsinger Jr., testified at his nomination hearing before the Senate health committee that he would support bans on the advertising of prescription drugs and sugary children’s cereals, that high school students should be told that condoms are an appropriate form of birth control and that he was not antigay....

A difficult moment in the hearing for Dr. Holsinger came when Senator Barbara A. Mikulski, Democrat of Maryland, began her questioning. Fifteen years ago, Ms. Mikulski was chairwoman of a Senate committee with oversight of the Department of Veterans Affairs, where Dr. Holsinger was the chief medical officer....

She accused him of mishandling a sexual harassment scandal at an Atlanta veterans’ hospital. Dr. Holsinger, the father of four adult daughters, countered, “I care greatly about issues of women’s health.”

Wash. Post: Ex-Surgeon General Says White House Hushed Him

Christopher Lee reports in today's Washington Post:

Former surgeon general Richard H. Carmona yesterday accused the Bush administration of muzzling him on sensitive public health issues, becoming the most prominent voice among several current and former federal science officials who have complained of political interference.

Carmona, a Bush nominee who served from 2002 to 2006, told the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform that political appointees in the administration routinely scrubbed his speeches for politically sensitive content and blocked him from speaking out on public health matters such as stem cell research, abstinence-only sex education and the emergency contraceptive Plan B....

Carmona said that when the administration touted funding for abstinence-only education, he was prevented from discussing res