Stop SB371

Indiana legislators seem intent on making our state one of the least women-friendly in the country with Senate Bill 371.

This bill is yet another attempt by our representatives to make safe, legal abortions harder to obtain.

Dealing strictly with the abortion pill RU-486, SB371 requires that women get a transvaginal ultrasound to receive an abortion.

Originally the bill required two such ultrasounds, but it has since been
amended.

So now women only have to get a huge piece of medical equipment shoved up their vagina once.

Hallelujah.

Those who are actual doctors, unlike the bill’s author Sen. Travis Holdman, R-Markle, are against the provision because it is medically unnecessary.

According to Dr. John Stutsman and Dr. Brownsyne Tucker Edmonds, professors at IU School of Medicine, the required procedures would be unnecessary and invasive.

Blood and urine tests are cheaper, better ways of determining whether or not a woman is still pregnant.

If doctors felt these ultrasounds were medically necessary, they would already be performing them. 

The bill also requires any clinic that administers the pill to be up to surgery standards, meaning that at least one Planned Parenthood in Indiana would have to shut down its operations.

If women can’t get RU-486 from a clinic, they are more likely to turn to dangerous Internet substances claiming to have the same effects.

While pro-life supporters of the bill claim to have women’s best interests at heart, making legal abortions harder to obtain only means that more unsafe, illegal abortions will be performed. 

This bill is clearly an attempt to make abortions difficult to obtain without outlawing them, spitting on Roe v. Wade and all the women the case was trying to protect.

No one wants more abortions to happen, but there are better ways to prevent them.

If our senators wanted to actually reduce the number of abortions, they would write legislation calling for real sex education in our public schools.

When a woman needs an abortion, the time for this education has already passed.

Making the process more uncomfortable or more difficult isn’t going to change the fact that she is going to get an abortion.

Rather, it could change how safe her abortion is, could determine whether or not she survives.

Tell teenagers how to put on condoms.

Explain the birth control pill and intrauterine devices. Teach kids how to practice safe sex rather than try to scare them from it.

Obviously saying “don’t do it or else,” and then showing an STD slideshow is not cutting it.

RU-486 isn’t being handed out like candy on Halloween.

Stop telling doctors how to do their jobs. Stop telling women what to do with their bodies. Stop preventing access to safe, legal abortions. Stop SB371.