URGENT : a federal appeals court just ruled that Texas may enforce a near-total statewide abortion ban for as long as the coronavirus pandemic lasts.1
The anti-choice governor and attorney general of Texas categorized abortion as a "nonessential" service that must be shut down during the pandemic, and the Republican majority on the Fifth Circuit Court upheld the ban, allowing it to go into effect immediately.
Abortion providers are now reporting that the ban has caused incredible confusion and distress among their patients as appointments are canceled and people scramble to figure out their options for abortion care in other states.2
We've never seen a court allow any state to ban abortion for any reason. We need to fight back NOW before this ban spreads to even more states around the country.
Let's be clear : abortion is essential health care. You can't just "put it off" like an elective surgery. And when women cannot access the abortion care they need, they are forced to travel long distances or take even more desperate measures.
But these anti-choice extremists only care about one thing : controlling women's bodies and lives.
To make things even worse, Louisiana and Mississippi, which are also part of the Fifth Circuit, may be able to implement their own coronavirus abortion bans. And anti-choice governors and attorneys general in Iowa, Ohio, Oklahoma, and Alabama are trying to use the pandemic to ban abortion as well.3,4
As it is, women--and women of color, especially--are already bearing the heaviest burden under coronavirus.
Women are on the front line of this pandemic. Women fill a majority of the positions in the health-care industry, where they are risking their lives to provide urgent care. Most teachers are women, at a time when educators are scrambling to reinvent the entire American education system for distance learning. Women are more likely to be laid off when restaurants and hotels close. And, of course, when a child stays home from school or an elderly family member gets sick, it's most often a woman who steps up to provide the needed care.
This is nothing but a shameless attempt to take advantage of the pandemic to push an ideological agenda that hurts women.
The good news is that right now, millions of Americans are at home and paying attention, and the overwhelming majority of people support abortion access. That's why we're giving people across the country an opportunity to speak out by launching digital actions to demand that states stop these dangerous efforts to ban abortion. Will you donate $ 5 ?
Shaunna, Kat, Kathy, Anathea, Sonja, Melody, Lindsay, Pam, Maria, Kimberly, and Katie, the UltraViolet Action team.
Sources :
1. Appeals court allows Texas to ban abortions during pandemic, The Hill, March 31, 2020
2. 'Sadness Beyond Tears' as COVID-19 Abortion Ban Brings Chaos to Texas Clinics, Rewire, April 2, 2020
3. Texas and Ohio Include Abortion as Medical Procedures That Must Be Delayed, The New York Times, March 23, 2020
4. Judges block 3 states from enforcing abortion bans pegged to pandemic, Politico, March 30, 2020
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