Lift the Military Ban on Abortion Once and for All

I am as much a fan as the next person of watching ping pong. Right downstairs in my apartment building in Korea is a rec room with two tables, and the people who use them get pretty excited. The ball gets bounced back and forth and everyone has a good time.

But what isn't fun is when that ball is a military woman's right to complete medical care, and when the dudes bouncing it back and forth with paddles, never even feeling the effects of the ball, are Congress, the President, and the Department of Defense. Unfortunately, that is exactly what has been happening to the reproductive freedoms of women in uniform and the civilian dependents of uniformed men since the 1970s. One person enacts a ban in military facilities, another lifts it ... then someone else comes along and bounces it back into place. Meanwhile, women watch the dizzying display, wondering if anyone actually gives a damn that we have bodies and lives that are at stakes here.

The Guttmacher Institute reports what I already know: that the current ban on allowing women access abortions in military facilities overseas — even with their own money — is absurd. It is a hypocritical policy, insisting that women put on a uniform or support a man who does, giving their lives to defend a country that allows other women access to a legal and protected medical procedure that is denied them while ordered to another country.

Uniformed women and dependents in the States or who are stationed in countries where abortion is accessible are free (while dealing with the issue of getting leave) to seek off-post clinics and medical facilities where their right to all medical care is upheld (considering they have the appropriate monetary privilege). Those stationed overseas in countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan, Djibouti, and Republic of Korea, where abortion is not legal or accessible, surrendering privacy, and securing funding. Guttmacher also notes that it is mostly the junior enlisted — those making the lowest pay — who face unplanned pregnancies, so paying for travel and international medical care is possibly an enormous burden.

But the Burris Amendment would fix all of that. It would ensure that military women would have access to the highest quality of care available to military personnel and their families. The Burris Amendment would be a way for servicewomen facing unplanned pregnancies to make a choice to end a pregnancy sooner and return to work faster rather than be another decimal in the attrition rate. Allowing women to pay for their own abortions could save the military the cost of training a new recruit every time some general thinks it might be fun to court martial some pregnant woman.

Opponents in the House, like my buddy Ike Skelton (D-MO), staunchly oppose this amendment. It is vital to speak up and let lawmakers know that uniformed women and civilian dependents deserve all medical care.

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