State abortion clinic restrictions could impact women's health care access

Stateline reports that abortion opponents are advancing new clinic standards that may be impossible to meet. Abortion rights supporters fear these rules could force many clinics to close, making it more difficult for some women to get a broad array of health care services.

Stateline: New Laws Turn Focus To Women's Health Care Access
New state restrictions on clinics that provide abortions could leave millions of women-;many of them poor and uninsured-;without easy access to cancer screenings and other basic health care services. In recent years, abortion opponents have tried to limit abortions by barring them after a certain number of weeks and by requiring women who want to end their pregnancies to have ultrasounds. Those strategies target abortion directly. Now abortion opponents in some states are pushing for new standards for clinics, such as requiring doctors to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital, that may be difficult or impossible for them to meet. Abortion rights supporters fear the new rules could force many clinics to close-;a result that would make it more difficult for women to get a broad array of health care services, not just abortions (Grovum, 7/24).

And in the news about Plan B -

Boston Globe: Plan B One-Step Gets Exclusive Rights
The US Food and Drug Administration decided late Monday night to grant exclusive rights to Teva Pharmaceuticals to put its brand name form of emergency contraception on drugstore shelves without any age restrictions for the next three years. Plan B One-Step, Teva's product, has started to appear in some drugstores this week on shelves next to spermicides and pregnancy tests. It has new packaging saying it can safely be taken by women and girls of all ages to prevent pregnancy within three days of unprotected sex. The FDA will allow generic manufacturers of the one-pill form of emergency contraception -- which contains high doses of the female hormone progestin -- to place their products directly on drugstore shelves (Kotz, 7/23).