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“Call Obama!”

by Melinda Tuhus | Jan 28, 2010 8:11 am

(1) Comment | Commenting has been closed | E-mail the Author

Posted to: Health Care

Melinda Tuhus Photo Health advocate Byllye Avery urged a New Haven audience of activists to continue fighting for health care reform that works for women, their families and their communities.

She summed up her message in town words: “Call Obama!”

Avery, founder of the National Black Women’s Health Project, made the call Tuesday night during a speech at First & Summerfield Church on the Green, hosted by New Haven-based Planned Parenthood of Southern New England.

Planned Parenthood Vice president Susan Yolen (pictured) told the group of about three dozen women—black and white, and including teens, middle aged and older women who have fought many reproductive rights battles in the past—that most private health insurance plans up to now have included abortion coverage. Policy holders may not have been aware of it if they never needed the service, but she warned that the Stupak amendment in the House health reform bill will require women to buy a separate policy covering abortion. She said that’s unacceptable.

“Women should certainly not be worse off after health care reform than we have been beforehand,” she said, adding with a chuckle, “Separate checks are fine for dinner, but not for health care.”

Theresa Younger (pictured), executive executive director of the state’s Permanent Commission on the Status of Women, called anti-abortion measures like Stupak an attack on all women’s rights. “We need to stop separating out the fact that reproductive health is a separate set of rights,” she said. “It is our rights; it belongs to us and it’s part of our body and part of our innate ability to be who we were born to be.” She added that women in Connecticut had fought long and hard to secure those rights, and that in any federal legislation, “Connecticut should be the floor, not the ceiling” of what’s included.

Then Younger introduced Avery, who’s been at the forefront of struggles around women’s health care for decades. Avery’s organization is now called the National Women’s Health Network; she was promoting a network project, Raising Women’s Voices.

Several times Avery called for the uninsured and under-insured to be leading the fight for better health care legislation, saying their absence is akin to what the struggle for civil rights would have been without the leadership of black Americans.

She handed out a comparison of the House and Senate health reform bills, with a check before each component that was considered the better one. The House version had many more checks than the Senate version (under headings of covering more people, making coverage more affordable, making coverage fairer and addressing health disparities). Even under “Women’s health provisions,” the House version was deemed superior because it “prevents victims of domestic violence and sexual assault from insurance denials for pre-existing conditions” and “does not restore funding for abstinence education programs, which have not proven effective.” But there’s a big black X on the Stupak amendment, which bans abortion coverage (except in cases of rape, incest or threat to the woman’s life) in any plan in the national insurance exchange that has even one policy holder receiving a federal subsidy, and another big black X on the Senate bill’s abortion provisions (known as the Nelson amendment), that is somewhat less draconian.

Avery urged her listeners to contact their senators and representatives to call for final language that provides the best options for women, and to “Call the president! We have to make him do the right thing—push true health care reform.” She gave out the White House phone number (202-456-1111) and website frequently.

Domenia Dickey, a senior at Sound School and a youth mentor at Planned Parenthood’s STARS (Students Teaching About Responsible Sexuality) program, was one of the young activists in the audience.

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posted by: Tessa Marquis on January 28, 2010  1:57pm

Wonderful and thought-provoking evening.

Ms Avery is inspiring with her blending of eyewitness stories of the struggle for women’s healthcare over more than 30 years. My takeaway, along with the need to get more underinsured and uninsured folks to speak out and stand up, was Avery’s comment: “If you are not at the table, you are on the menu”.

Congrats to the student from Sound School, for speaking up and out.

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