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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE |
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State
Rep. Daylin Leach |
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Leach pushes for passage of his bill that would help rape victims
HARRISBURG, Oct. 2 – Joined by other state lawmakers, state Rep. Daylin Leach, D-Montgomery, held a news conference today to rally support for his legislation (H.B. 288) that would implement a statewide protocol for the standardized care of rape victims. The bill is expected to be voted on this week by the full House of Representatives.
Leach’s bill (H.B. 288) would ensure that rape victims who visit emergency rooms are provided with comprehensive care, offered consultation with a rape crisis counselor and provided accurate, easy-to-understand educational materials. It would also require hospitals to provide information about emergency contraception to victims, alert them that the hospital can give it to them, and to do so if the victims ask for it.
Currently, some Pennsylvania hospitals, including some religious-affiliated hospitals, do not provide rape victims with emergency contraception.
Leach said rape victims do not usually choose what hospital they are brought to. Instead, they are often rushed to a hospital in an ambulance or go themselves (or with family) to the closest facility available. Further, some areas, particularly poorer ones, are only served by one hospital.
“We owe it to these victims of such a violent crime to ensure that they have access to the best medical care available,” Leach said. “A woman who has been raped should not have to worry about the religious beliefs held by the board of directors of the hospital she is rushed to. Certainly some religions don’t favor contraception. But the victim very well might, and the decision should be hers, in accordance with her religion, not some hospital administrator’s in accordance with his.”
The Catholic bishops of the United States, as well as New York, Wisconsin and New Jersey’s Catholic bishops, support emergency contraception in
emergency room mandates. And last month, in a major softening of their
position, Connecticut’s Catholic bishops announced that Catholic hospitals
would comply with that state’s new law that requires them to dispense emergency
contraceptive pills to rape victims.
“They know that while emergency contraception does not result in abortions, women getting raped does result in pregnancies,” Leach said. “I would hope that Pennsylvania can join the ranks of other states that protect rape victims from unwanted pregnancy.”
More than 50 percent of Pennsylvania hospitals do not currently provide emergency contraception. Each year in the United States, 25,000 women become pregnant as a result of rape, and it is estimated that 22,000 of those pregnancies could have been prevented. Involuntary pregnancy is considered a primary reason why girls and women get abortions in the United States.
Emergency contraception differs from RU-486, the controversial “abortion pill,” because it does not terminate an already conceived fetus. Emergency contraception is only effective in preventing an unwanted pregnancy during a brief window of opportunity, usually around 72 hours. Therefore, it is essential that women who have been sexually assaulted receive accurate information and comprehensive access to medical care.
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Leach said he hoped his legislation would help rape victims, who already suffer from feelings of shame and embarrassment, to avoid being further traumatized by having to carry a child to term.
“To those who oppose this legislation, I wonder if you ever examine your conscience and consider the women who you are trying to sentence to an unwanted pregnancy at the hands of a brutal rapist, and the unborn children you are sentencing to be aborted as a result.”
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CONTACT: Ann Collis |