I am a doctor in North Dakota, and I love my work. One of the most rewarding aspects of my job is helping cancer survivors who are now facing infertility from their lifesaving chemotherapy and radiation treatments achieve their dream of having a family. Some of these patients require in-vitro fertilization to have a baby, but others must rely on donor sperm or donor egg. However, if some of our lawmakers have their way, I will have to turn away cancer survivors and as well as many other couples with infertility.
By Elissa Berger, Advocacy and Policy Counsel, ACLU at 1:26pm
Isn't it outrageous that we even have to ask that question?
In Arkansas this week, the State Senate passed a bill that would ban almost all abortions. Within a month, women in Arkansas could be prevented from receiving abortion care, no matter what their circumstances.
In North Dakota, the legislature is poised to vote on set of bills that aim to ban abortion, close down women's health centers, and could prevent couples from using in-vitro fertilization to build their family. The Senate is expected to vote on those bills next week.
I've worked at United Parcel Service (UPS) for almost 10 years. Initially I got this job because I needed a part-time job with benefits while attending college and UPS seemed like an ideal place to work. Reality set in nine years later when I became pregnant.
At the time of my pregnancy I was classified as a full-time driver. The work that a driver does is extremely demanding, and many of those hired don’t actually last. Being a driver is strenuous and physically exhausting. During the busy season I work up to 14 hours a day under harsh conditions, and during the summer rush, the size and weight of the packages explode.
By Brigitte Amiri, ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project at 4:31pm
Yesterday the ACLU filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the first challenge to the federal contraceptive rule to reach an appeals court on the merits. The federal contraceptive rule requires health plans to cover contraception without a co-pay, and despite the plethora of lawsuits, the rule is clearly constitutional.
By Brigitte Amiri, ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project at 4:20pm
Sheer repetition of an incorrect argument does not make that argument correct. This holds true for the lawsuits challenging the federal contraception rule, which ensures that millions of women will have access to contraception without a co-pay. Those who are trying to eliminate the rule in the courts have now filed almost 45 lawsuits. They can file 100 lawsuits, but it won’t change the legal analysis. As we’ve said before, the contraception rule is constitutional. For the last five decades, courts have held that rules designed to eradicate discrimination – like the contraception rule – cannot be trumped by a business owner’s religious beliefs.
By now, most of us have read (and wept over) the tragic story of Savita Halappanavar -- the woman an Irish hospital let die rather than provide the abortion that she needed to save her life. News of her death has generated outrage across the globe and a call from Secretary Clinton to the Irish government to ensure that women are protected.
By Elissa Berger, Advocacy and Policy Counsel, ACLU at 5:16pm
Yesterday, Michiganders were illegally blocked from entering the State Capitol as their legislature passed controversial bills. Hundreds of people came to the Capitol to have their voices heard, but they were kept out of the political process by the very folks whose job it is to represent them.
Not only did they pass the so-called “right to work” legislation, but with the public locked outside, these politicians also advanced bills that will interfere with a woman’s ability to make her own reproductive health decisions. Politicians pushed a bill designed to shut down women’s health clinics in the state that provide abortion care. They passed a measure that would prohibit insurance plans from offering comprehensive health care coverage that includes abortion. And, a little more than a month after news broke that woman died in a hospital in Ireland because doctors refused to provide a life-saving abortion, the state senate passed a bill that could allow hospitals to use religion to discriminate in providing health care services, even in the case of an emergency.
