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Compiled By GayToday
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Washington, D.C.--"Despite his promise to unite and not divide the country, President Bush has used his first days in office to launch an assault on the fundamental human and civil right of reproductive choice," said Gloria Feldt, president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, reacting to the announcement that the Bush administration would re-impose Reagan-era restrictions on international family planning. |
President George W. Bush has swung back to the right in just one day on the job |
"This action threatens global progress to provide life-saving family planning and reproductive health services to millions of women and men around the world," Feldt remarked. "The reinstatement of the global gag rule is particularly hostile on the anniversary of the Roe decision.
While the Roe decision saved women's lives here at home, around the world nearly 600,000 women still die every year from pregnancy related causes, unsafe abortion among them. These new restrictions will prevent family planning providers overseas from even speaking to their clients, or to their governments, about this grave risk to women's health," Feldt said.
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Since no international family planning dollars are spent on abortions, the gag rule means only that there will be less family planning available. Family planning prevents abortion by preventing unintended pregnancies and protecting women's health.
"And while these vulnerable women in other countries are being offered up as today's sacrifice to the demands of the anti-choice extremists, we seriously doubt Bush will stop there. It is only a matter of time before this administration tries to strip away everything women gained in the last 28 years," Feldt said.
Planned Parenthood has launched a major effort to mobilize grassroots activists across the country on this issue through a new Web site, www.RoeVBush.com. In its first few days of operation, the Web site received half a million hits.
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Family Values & Population: A Reply to the Contraceptive Critics
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India's Population Reaches 1 Billion
Related Sites:
Roe V. Bush
White House: Official Site
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"Americans are realizing that this administration represents a grave threat to reproductive health and reproductive rights. The time to act is now," Feldt said.
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