{"id":274479,"date":"2010-02-04T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2010-02-04T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rhrealitycheck.org\/blog\/2010\/02\/02\/the-state-choice-ohio-lots-roadblocks-but-also-some-victories-ahead"},"modified":"2010-02-04T11:20:08","modified_gmt":"2010-02-04T16:20:08","slug":"updated-the-state-of-choice-in-ohio-lots-of-roadblocks-but-also-some-victories-ahead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/274479","title":{"rendered":"Updated: The State of Choice in Ohio: Lots of Roadblocks, But Also Some Victories Ahead"},"content":{"rendered":"

\nOhio has been through a lot in recent
\nyears.\u00a0 The state has been hard hit economically by the recession, and
\nunemployment skyrocketed into double digits in 2009<\/span><\/a><\/a>.\u00a0 Ohio is beginning to recover
\nfinancially, but one thing it may take longer to recover from is the profusion
\nof anti-choice laws passed within the last year.\u00a0 Women and families
\nalready suffering due to the economic downturn are finding themselves in even
\nmore difficult circumstances once anti-choice politicians put cutting off
\naccess to basic reproductive health care ahead of caring for the needy.\n<\/p>\n

\nAccess to reproductive health is an important public health issue. According to
\nNARAL Pro-Choice Ohio<\/a>, in 2009 half
\nof all pregnancies in the state were unplanned, and 40 percent of unplanned
\npregnancies ended in abortion.\u00a0Twenty-five percent of all adolescent girls
\nhad a sexually transmitted disease and 16,000 teenage girls gave birth last
\nyear.\u00a0 Ohio ranks 25th in the country in teen pregnancy rates, a rate that
\nhas increased by 3 percent every year since 2005.\n<\/p>\n

\nOf course, it’s hard to reduce the number of unintended pregnancies when the
\nstate ranks 48th in the nation for access to contraception<\/span><\/a><\/a>. Should a woman have unprotected sex and wish
\nto avoid pregnancy, she won’t find easy access to emergency contraception as
\none-third of pharmacies in the state do not stock\u00a0 <\/span>it.\u00a0 If she then decides she wants an abortion, she had
\nbetter hope she lives in or near one of the six cities that have abortion
\nproviders, since she will have to come in, receive legislatively-mandated "consent" information<\/span><\/a><\/a>, then leave and return again 24 hours later.\n<\/p>\n

\nOne thing that has kept the anti-choice activists from gaining even more ground
\nis the state’s governor, Ted Strickland.\u00a0 As the first pro-choice governor
\nin Ohio since 1991, Gov. Strickland has been vetoing
\nanti-choice legislation<\/span><\/a><\/a>, such as the
\nlaw passed in 2007 to limit the use of RU 486.\u00a0 He also eliminated
\n$500,000 in abstinence-only education funds from the budget that same
\nyear.\u00a0 This year, Strickland did a line item veto on a provision
\nprohibiting the funding of stem cell research, much to the chagrin of anti-choice activists<\/span><\/a><\/a>.<\/p>\n

\nPerhaps the biggest victory for those who
\nsupport women’s access to reproductive health care is the introduction of the
\nOhio Prevention First Act. This legislation requires insurance companies to
\ncover contraception at the same rate as it would other prescriptions, requires
\nthat sex education taught in schools be medically accurate and contain
\ninformation on both contraception and sexually transmitted diseases, creates a
\ntask force focused on the high rate of teen pregnancy, forces hospitals to
\nprovide victims of rape and sexual assault with emergency contraception, and
\nrules that pharmacists must stock and fill orders for contraceptives without
\nopting out due to "conscience" issues.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n"Prevention-First legislation enabled us to be in a proactive stand, which
\nwas both exciting and quite unusual," said Wendy Leatherberry, a
\nnon-profit consultant active in the pro-choice movement in Ohio.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\nOther victories include shooting down some more outrageous roadblock bills such
\nas the "paternal consent" bill<\/span><\/a><\/a> introduced by State Rep. John Adams,
\nR-Sidney.\u00a0 The bill, which gained little traction in the legislature,
\nwould have required women to obtain permission from the biological father
\nbefore having an abortion, and, in cases of more than one partner, the woman
\nmust provide a full list of men with whom she had sex.\u00a0 Women who lied
\nabout the identify of the potential father or doctors who aborted without
\npermission from the father would be prosecuted.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n"People are very comfortable in the anti-choice world, bolder and more
\ncomfortable with their position of preventing women from getting
\nabortions," stated Leatherberry.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\nIronically, the fate of reproductive health services in Ohio is unclear, but
\nnot because of well-funded anti-choice groups in the state.\u00a0 The 2010
\nelection will determine who is in charge of realigning the legislative
\ndistricts.\u00a0 Although a vast majority of Ohioans believe in sex ed in
\nschool and more access to contraception, and a small amount more identify as
\nstrongly\/somewhat pro choice than strongly\/somewhat pro-life, nearly two-thirds
\nof Ohio’s state senate and over half of its state house is anti or mixed
\nchoice, regardless of party. <\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\nOhio pro-choice advocates underscore that gerrymandering is responsible for the
\nlarge number of anti-choice elected officials, a factor they hope can be
\nchanged during the next redistricting.\u00a0 However, Jennifer Garrison, the state Democratic
\nParty’s leading candidate
\nfor Secretary of State, who, if elected would be highly influential in the
\nredistricting process, was also anti-choice, believing abortion should only be
\nallowed in cases of rape or due to threats to a mother’s health. <\/span>Garrison has now left the race, citing too much focus on her anti-choice stance<\/a>.\u00a0 Instead, county clerk Maryellen O’Shaughnessy will be filing to run for the party nomination, with the support of Gov. Strickland<\/a>. Current
\nSecretary of State Jennifer Brunner, who is pro-choice, is leaving
\nthe position to run for Ohio’s open senate seat<\/span><\/a><\/a>.\u00a0 Anti-choice forces in the state have
\nmade it clear that they are focusing on even more races, recently
\nreleasing their slate of 2010 pro-life endorsed candidates<\/span><\/a><\/a>.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\nSo with a surge of anti-choice activists from both parties hoping to strengthen
\ntheir hold on the legislature and with numerous state-based anti-choice groups
\nbeginning to fight among themselves for donations, Ohio will continue to be a
\nhotbed of activity throughout the year.<\/p>\n

<\/span>UPDATED to reflect the recent changes in the race for the office of Secretary of State.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ohio has been through a lot in recent years.\u00a0 The state has been hard hit economically by the recession, and unemployment skyrocketed into double digits in 2009.\u00a0 Ohio is beginning to recover financially, but one thing it may take longer to recover from is the profusion of anti-choice laws passed within the last year.\u00a0 Women […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4263,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-274479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4263"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=274479"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274479\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=274479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=274479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=274479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}