National Organization for Women-NYS Denounces "Health Care Reform on the Backs of Women"

ALBANY, NY (03/21/2010)(readMedia)-- NOW-NYS President Marcia Pappas is outraged about President Obama's "kowtowing to a handful of anti-choice zealots who, in spite of all evidence that the Health Care Bill prohibits federally-funded abortion, insisted upon it's reiteration in Executive Order." She says that it's "health care reform on the backs of women and at the price of women's health."

Pappas also objected to Obama's articulating a reinvigorated "conscience clause" through which many essential emergency services are denied. "For example, if a woman is raped, and she is brought to an emergency room, under the conscience clause she could be denied emergency contraception that she might so desperately need."

This executive order comes on the eve of the 38th Anniversary of Baird v Eisenstadt (3/22/10) a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing birth control for unmarried people in the United States. That ruling is the foundation for subsequent privacy cases such as Roe v. Wade and Lawrence v. Texas (for gay rights).

Pappas wondered: "Do the people of the United States realize the danger to their heath care rights rooted in the fundamental right to privacy? Do they realize that a small number of misinformed right wing extremists are determined to have the government force women to bear unwanted children?"

NOW-NYS joins with National NOW President Terry O'Neill, who stated: "Through this order, the President has announced he will lend the weight of his office and the entire executive branch to the anti-abortion measures included in the Senate bill, which the House is now prepared to pass. President Obama campaigned as a pro-choice president, but his actions today suggest that his commitment to reproductive health care is shaky at best. The message we have received today is that it is acceptable to negotiate health care on the backs of women, and we couldn't disagree more."