Ob-gyn: Republican policies harm women
President Obama has requested $1.9 billion to fight Zika, the mosquito-born illness that poses a threat to maternal child health, with potential to cause devastating anomalies in affected pregnancies.
The GOP has prepared a $1.1 billion Zika funding bill which, of course, contains provisions to limit Planned Parenthood funding. Obama has threatened to veto the bill, and funding will be delayed for months.
Only the Republican Party, when faced with a growing public-health crisis that calls for a swift response to provide family-planning services, research, and education would respond by further restrictions to women’s health care.
Zika is a real threat, but the GOP a far greater one. Republican Party policies are bad for women. The insidious political creep from the right on women’s rights and sovereignty is alarming to me as a woman and as a provider of women’s health care.
The Zika controversy is yet another illustration of the malignant priorities of the political right. I hope this slow, steady march of inequality and rancor (and the Aedes mosquito) will be halted by a concerted effort of concerned citizens, come November.
Mallory Kremer, obstetrician gynecologist, Fresno
This story was originally published June 27, 2016 at 4:17 PM with the headline "Ob-gyn: Republican policies harm women."