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Not so much pro-life as anti-choice....
Passing this article along from The Nation--take a hard look, folks. This is more of a "just the facts" about Mississippi as opposed to a rant in either direction.
It's enough to make me weep. Legal, safe and rare it ain't....
"With eight of nine US Supreme Court Justices over 65 and one seriously ill with cancer, much of the country is understandably focused on the possibility that their soon-to-be-appointed replacements will overturn the decision upholding the right to abortion. But in Mississippi, in many ways, Roe has already fallen."
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20050207&c=1&s=lerner
Excerpts:
" With the third-highest teen pregnancy rate in the country, Mississippi's low number of abortions is not an illustration of the "safe, legal and rare" ideal that many talk about, in which a decline in unwanted pregnancies creates a corresponding drop in abortions. Rather, it is the direct consequence of concerted opposition to abortion from the grassroots to all levels of government."
"Such concern for the rights of fetuses does not appear to translate into a commitment to promoting the well-being of the children they may become. The uncomfortable irony for an opposition movement purportedly concerned with saving "innocent babies" is that restrictions on abortion are associated with worse outcomes for actual babies. Indeed, children fare terribly in Mississippi. The state with arguably the least access to abortion also has the second-highest rate of child poverty in the country, according to the Children's Defense Fund. Mississippi's infant mortality rate--a good indication of the health of both women and children--is the highest in the country. For every 1,000 live births, 10.5 infants under age 1 die in Mississippi. In parts of the impoverished Delta region, that number ranges up to 18. (The national infant mortality rate, by comparison, is 6.8.) Interestingly, a postelection comparison found that "red" states had higher infant mortality rates than "blue" ones. In general, states that restrict abortion spend far less money per child than prochoice states on services such as foster care, education, welfare and the adoption of children who have physical and mental disabilities, according to a 2000 book by political scientist Jean Reith Schroedel."
And finally:
" Mississippi, the proclamation tells you, lives by a different law from the rest of the land--for now, anyway. And even while they challenge it simply by running Mississippi's last remaining abortion facility, Susan Hill and Betty Thompson have been forced to accept that reality. In his lawn chair outside the clinic, Roy McMillan rejoices in it. And the women of Mississippi, who sleep in their cars, shuttle out of state and bear unwanted children in poverty, live it."
It's enough to make me weep. Legal, safe and rare it ain't....
"With eight of nine US Supreme Court Justices over 65 and one seriously ill with cancer, much of the country is understandably focused on the possibility that their soon-to-be-appointed replacements will overturn the decision upholding the right to abortion. But in Mississippi, in many ways, Roe has already fallen."
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20050207&c=1&s=lerner
Excerpts:
" With the third-highest teen pregnancy rate in the country, Mississippi's low number of abortions is not an illustration of the "safe, legal and rare" ideal that many talk about, in which a decline in unwanted pregnancies creates a corresponding drop in abortions. Rather, it is the direct consequence of concerted opposition to abortion from the grassroots to all levels of government."
"Such concern for the rights of fetuses does not appear to translate into a commitment to promoting the well-being of the children they may become. The uncomfortable irony for an opposition movement purportedly concerned with saving "innocent babies" is that restrictions on abortion are associated with worse outcomes for actual babies. Indeed, children fare terribly in Mississippi. The state with arguably the least access to abortion also has the second-highest rate of child poverty in the country, according to the Children's Defense Fund. Mississippi's infant mortality rate--a good indication of the health of both women and children--is the highest in the country. For every 1,000 live births, 10.5 infants under age 1 die in Mississippi. In parts of the impoverished Delta region, that number ranges up to 18. (The national infant mortality rate, by comparison, is 6.8.) Interestingly, a postelection comparison found that "red" states had higher infant mortality rates than "blue" ones. In general, states that restrict abortion spend far less money per child than prochoice states on services such as foster care, education, welfare and the adoption of children who have physical and mental disabilities, according to a 2000 book by political scientist Jean Reith Schroedel."
And finally:
" Mississippi, the proclamation tells you, lives by a different law from the rest of the land--for now, anyway. And even while they challenge it simply by running Mississippi's last remaining abortion facility, Susan Hill and Betty Thompson have been forced to accept that reality. In his lawn chair outside the clinic, Roy McMillan rejoices in it. And the women of Mississippi, who sleep in their cars, shuttle out of state and bear unwanted children in poverty, live it."