Virginia Uses Pretense of Public Health to Shut Down Abortion Providers

Last Friday, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli issued an opinion stating that the Commonwealth of Virginia has the authority to regulate abortion clinics, even those providing first-trimester abortions, in the same way it regulates hospitals. Cuccinelli and his supporters say that stricter regulation of abortion facilities is good for women's health; the effect, of course, is to shut down clinics which cannot comply. Tarina Keene, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Virginia, said that if enacted, new regulations could shut down 17 of the 21 abortion providers in the state.

Since becoming attorney general in January, Cuccinelli has launched a tireless, yet largely unsuccessful, culture-war offensive. In March, he tried unsuccessfully to get Virginia's universities to undo discrimination bans based on sexual orientation (i.e. he's pro-discrimination); he lost a crusade to have the left breast of the goddess on the state seal covered up; launched a suit against the EPA and another against "Obamacare"; and then took on climate change research at the University of Virginia. As a state senator, Cuccinelli tried to shut down abortion clinics through increased regulation. Now that he's won a promotion, he may have found a way to do it.

Because the courts have shown a willingness to regulate abortion, allowing all manner of obstacles to access as long as they pass the "undue burden" test, whether or not these regulations go into effect will depend on Virginia's board of health or the state legislature. So far, conservative governor Bob McDonnell has shown support.

Proponents use terms like "equality" and "women's life and health," lauding Cuccinelli's opinion as a victory for women's safety. But as Monica Potts at the TAPPED blog pointed out, abortions are very safe in the United States and the surest way to make them unsafe is to make them harder to get. In fact, the best way to make women unsafe is to ban abortion. Already, Virginia is not a very abortion-friendly state. According to the Guttmacher Institute, public funds will only help women in dire situations, a minor needs parental consent, a women must undergo counseling and a 24-hour waiting period, and, as of 2008, only 57% of women lived in a county with an abortion provider. In fact, the number of providers has almost been cut in half since the number peaked in the early 1980s.

There are a few ironies in the current situation. The first, as mentioned, is requirements that should protect women will actually make them less safe and their constitutional rights more scarce. The second is the argument that abortions should receive equal treatment when it comes to regulated medical procedures. In fact, the medical establishment has shunned abortion providers. As a powerful piece in the New York Times Magazine recently detailed, hospitals, medical schools, and doctors abandoned abortions to the clinics that rose up to fill the void  and meet women's needs.

Abortion providers want more doctors to be trained to perform abortions, and for abortion to return to the mainstream as an accepted aspect of women's medical care. And, as research shows, the more availability, the less abortions actually take place. Rather than protect women, Cuccinelli and his cohorts' anti-abortion activism would abandon women to unsafe abortion providers. You'd think it was opposite day in the attorney general's office, except that anti-abortion crusaders never actually put forward policies that help women.

Photo credit: openDemocracy