Every one of the major professional associations representing health care providers who treat women and girls have signed a letter to HHS Secretary Michael Leavitt opposing draft regulations restricting access to birth control.

The Bush administration wants

women to have the worst in reproductive healthcare. As an ob/gyn, I

am proud to say that my colleagues and I won’t stand for it.

A few weeks ago, draft regulations

under consideration by the Department of Health and Human Services surfaced

in the press,

rules that would expand the definition of abortion to include certain

forms of birth control — including IUDs and emergency contraception — and

allow healthcare providers to withhold these methods from their patients.

In some cases the IUD is by

far the safest and most effective method of birth control for women. I can’t

imagine hiding the IUD from my patients who need it, like a woman I

recently treated who is living with breast cancer. Nor can I fathom

treating the rape survivor in front of me without offering her EC. My

patients come to me for advice and facts. Ideology should not be a barrier

to their care.

But the Bush administration

wants my clinic and healthcare facilities around the country "not

to discriminate" against doctors or any other staff who would withhold

contraception from women who rely on it to continue working, going to

school, and raising the children they already have. In essence, the

Department of Health and Human Services finds it both healthy and humane

to hire people who don’t believe in women’s healthcare to provide

women’s healthcare. As a July 30 article in the Washington Post

noted, patients’ health should come first in the medical world, not

religion or politics.

Sex. Abortion. Parenthood. Power. The latest news, delivered straight to your inbox. SUBSCRIBE

To urge HHS to scrap the draft

rules and protect women’s healthcare, all of the major professional

associations representing physicians, nurses, and nurse practitioners

who treat women and girls have written a letter (below) to HHS Secretary

Michael Leavitt. These organizations account for roughly 410,000 medical

professionals, all of whom want the best for their patients.

Physicians for Reproductive

Choice and Health and I are working with

Sen. Hillary Clinton and other elected officials to fight the draft regulations. To spread

the word as far as we can, we are using the media and blog posts like

this one. Please join us in taking action against the Bush administration’s

outrageous proposal.

And after you read the letter

below, please do what you can to circulate it. Thank you.

The Honorable Michael O. Leavitt

Secretary

U.S. Department of Health and

Human Services

200 Independence Avenue, SW

Washington, DC 20201

July 30, 2008

Dear Secretary Leavitt:

On behalf of the undersigned

health care providers and professionals, we are writing to express our

grave concerns about a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

(HHS) draft proposed regulation, which we believe will threaten and

restrict women’s access to reproductive health and birth control services.

If implemented, this regulation would upend state laws protecting women’s

access to care and erect barriers to obtaining basic health services,

at a time when we should be working together to expand access to preventive

health care.

The HHS draft regulation confuses

contraception with abortion. By doing so, it undermines our shared national

goal of reducing unintended pregnancy and abortion. The oral contraceptive

pill is the most common contraceptive method in the country, and 82%

of women have relied on oral contraceptives at some time in their lives.

Oral contraceptives, when taken consistently and correctly, are extremely

effective at preventing ovulation. Yet the proposed regulation would

threaten the state laws that improve access to contraception. Moreover,

the regulation specifically defines as problematic state laws that require

employers who offer drug benefits to cover contraception, require hospitals

to offer emergency contraception to rape survivors and require pharmacies

to fill valid prescriptions. Loss of these protections compromises women’s

access to medical services and safe and effective birth control.

The proposed regulation would

redefine abortion as "any of the various procedures – including

the prescription, dispensing, and administration of any drug or the

performance of any procedure or any other action – that results in

the termination of the life of a human being in utero between conception

and natural birth, whether before or after implantation." This definition

is contrary to major medical authorities, including the American College

of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the American Medical Association,

and the British Medical Association, which define an established pregnancy

as occurring after a fertilized egg is implanted in the lining of the

uterus. The sweeping proposed definition is so overly-broad that it

could capture a range of hormonal contraceptives and nonhormonal devices

approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to prevent pregnancy.

Furthermore, the draft regulation

expands the scope of providers who can claim objections. The meaning

of the term "assist in the performance" is broadened to include

even people tangentially related to patient care, such as those employed

to clean medical instruments, health care entities, such as HMOs, and

health insurance plans. In fact, entire institutions receiving funding

from HHS could choose to make birth control unavailable to their patients.

We urge the Administration

to reconsider this detrimental regulation.

Sincerely,

American Academy of Family

Physicians

American Academy of Pediatrics

American College of Nurse Midwives

American College of Obstetricians

& Gynecologists

American Medical Women’s

Association

American Nurses Association

Association of Women’s Health,

Obstetric & Neonatal Nurses

Physicians for Reproductive

Choice and Health

Society for Adolescent Medicine