PoAC: Reproductive hullabaloo
May. 17th, 2006 12:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
The issue is this article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/15/AR2006051500875.html?referrer=emailarticle
Basically, it lists some new federal (American) guidelines saying that all women of reproductive age should treat themselves, and be treated by the health care system, as pre-pregnant. That means taking folic acid supplements, not smoking, maintaining a healthy weight - you get the idea.
I have some comments about this.
1) No one is forcing anything here, or suggesting that anything be forced. These are guidelines for family pratitioners and other front-line medical personnel to include in their regular care, elements relating to a woman's potential fertility. I would imagine that if your doctor asked some of these questions, and you told him you never intend to be pregnant and would abort any pregnancy that happened by accident, he would back off - and if he didn't, you should vote with your feet and find a new doctor. These are simply on the list of things women should be doing for optimal health.
2) I see no assumption here that every woman is simply a womb with legs. What I see is an understanding that 80% of women will be mothers at some point in their lives, and about 50% of pregnancies in North America are unplanned. Given those stats, it seems reasonable to offer counselling about reproductive health to women coming for regular medical attention, as part of a general check-up. It's always up to the woman to refuse to take the advice, of course.
3) These guidelines are sensible. They should be part of regular healthy-living counselling even for women who will not be having babies - yes, even the folic acid one.
4) The spin that has been put on this recommendation is unfortunate, because it raises spectres of forced pregnancy for those who are already concerned about that. However, throwing out the recommendations because you're afraid of the source is throwing the baby out with the bathwater - if you'll forgive the expression.
5) While the main source of the recommendation is the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, which is a somewhat suspect organization, the backers of the recommendation are not tainted that way. They include the College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the March of Dimes, and other agencies concerned with two main categories: birth defects, and women's health. Therefore, I would say any bias that exists in targetting women only is a function of the goal of the guidelines, which is to reduce birth defects in unplanned pregnancies. This goal is almost entirely independent of a man's role in reproduction, making it logical to leave him out.
Final analysis: the spin was unfortunate, but the recommendations are reasonable in and of themselves. I'm going to find something more worthy to be scared of.
Basically, it lists some new federal (American) guidelines saying that all women of reproductive age should treat themselves, and be treated by the health care system, as pre-pregnant. That means taking folic acid supplements, not smoking, maintaining a healthy weight - you get the idea.
I have some comments about this.
1) No one is forcing anything here, or suggesting that anything be forced. These are guidelines for family pratitioners and other front-line medical personnel to include in their regular care, elements relating to a woman's potential fertility. I would imagine that if your doctor asked some of these questions, and you told him you never intend to be pregnant and would abort any pregnancy that happened by accident, he would back off - and if he didn't, you should vote with your feet and find a new doctor. These are simply on the list of things women should be doing for optimal health.
2) I see no assumption here that every woman is simply a womb with legs. What I see is an understanding that 80% of women will be mothers at some point in their lives, and about 50% of pregnancies in North America are unplanned. Given those stats, it seems reasonable to offer counselling about reproductive health to women coming for regular medical attention, as part of a general check-up. It's always up to the woman to refuse to take the advice, of course.
3) These guidelines are sensible. They should be part of regular healthy-living counselling even for women who will not be having babies - yes, even the folic acid one.
4) The spin that has been put on this recommendation is unfortunate, because it raises spectres of forced pregnancy for those who are already concerned about that. However, throwing out the recommendations because you're afraid of the source is throwing the baby out with the bathwater - if you'll forgive the expression.
5) While the main source of the recommendation is the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, which is a somewhat suspect organization, the backers of the recommendation are not tainted that way. They include the College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the March of Dimes, and other agencies concerned with two main categories: birth defects, and women's health. Therefore, I would say any bias that exists in targetting women only is a function of the goal of the guidelines, which is to reduce birth defects in unplanned pregnancies. This goal is almost entirely independent of a man's role in reproduction, making it logical to leave him out.
Final analysis: the spin was unfortunate, but the recommendations are reasonable in and of themselves. I'm going to find something more worthy to be scared of.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 04:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 04:52 pm (UTC)Mind you, it could be argued that Viagra and the whole erectile disfunction issue is exactly that - the male version of these types of recommendations for women.
And I agree that there should be something in these recommendations suggesting that this is good general advice even for women who will never have children. There's no reason why non-reproducing women should feel left out of good health care - that's just carelessness on the part of the people issuing the recommendations.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-19 04:39 pm (UTC)Lest I sound particularly paranoid, I will note one of my older second cousins is a doctor, and used to bemoan the lack of female cadavers for dissection in medical school. The doctors-to-be literally learned only male bodies. She once showed me a fascinating book about the human body, and pointed to the drawings of "cut-aways" of the muscular system of a female and a male human. The muscles of the male groin/abdominal area were well known and completely drawn in. The muscles of the female groin/abdominal area were simply reflections of the male's, except around the lower groin, which was smooth and featureless as a Barbie doll.
As my cousin noted, there are a great many muscular differences in the female there... but the book simply didn't note them, because they didn't know -- the female subject in that time period (when she was becoming a doctor) was not worthy of extensive research. Frankly I would not wish to trust my health to a book which copped out with a sort of map-maker's "here there be dragons" mentality to what it doesn't know.
And that's why I find the "labeling" of this issue alarming: it reverts to a sort of "you're not the norm, you're the means of re-creating the male norm" mentality which I really don't want to see becoming more common in my country. Paranoid? Perhaps. On the other hand, why wasn't this labeled as simply good medical advice for all women? Why can't I buy Norplant in my country any more, despite it working excellently for me, and why do I not see any other easy-to-use forms of birth control coming up on the medical horizon? Why are pharmacists being allowed to (in effect) prescribe drugs for women based on nothing more than their personal morality, rather than on the medical needs of the woman herself?
In the end, birth control is simply the medical issue I'm most familiar with. What other, more important medical issues is this particular US government meddling ignorantly in? That's what scares me most.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-19 07:36 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 04:59 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 05:02 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 05:30 pm (UTC)I may have a few facts wrong here, but I personally am surprised at all the hullabaloo. (And lest this spark anything, I am agreeing with your points, not arguing... *Smile*)
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 05:52 pm (UTC)It's another step in the gradual erosion of abortion rights, as far as I'm concerned. Rather than saying "if you accidentally get pregnant while on this medicine, you would be advised to abort the fetus", it's heading towards "we can't give you this procedure/medicine in case you accidentally get pregnant, because of course you wouldn't abort."
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 06:46 pm (UTC)We are not talking eugenics here
Date: 2006-05-17 06:20 pm (UTC)I have been to a nutritionist who recommended I take folic acid because I was at the right age to have children. She never once told me I had to have children. I just see this as good medical advice.
As far as men are concerned, yes they should be advised to keep themselves healthy but men's health and women's health are vastly different. They have no cycles, no menopause, nothing that so dramatically changes within their bodies on such a consistent basis.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 08:54 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 08:56 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 09:35 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 09:37 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 09:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-17 09:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-18 12:30 am (UTC)I've never smoked. I'd be happy if nobody ever INVENTED smoking, because sucking everyone else's exhale has done and continues to do some serious damage in my life. But, it's still legal, so I take my alleregy drugs and keep going. I take a crapload of vitamins and supplements, and my current weight isn't pushing my blood pressure up like before. My problem with treating my body as if it's "pre-pregnant" is that I also take three different drugs for psychiatric treatment that are NOT recommended during pregnancy. Someday, I may have to choose between my sanity/control of my actions and reproduction. I'd rather that choice be mine, not my government's.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-18 12:36 am (UTC)If it's true, it's frightening. I'm inclined to think it's an exaggeration, though.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-18 12:45 am (UTC)This is a scary, scary time to be a woman in this country. With what's already happening in South Dakota, I don't think it's advisable to allow any more government control of our health care. "Recommendations" are fine, as long as it stops there.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-18 12:51 am (UTC)We're agreed about the recommendations - as long as that's all they are, they're okay.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-12 09:05 pm (UTC)As someone who desperately wants to become a mother, and a midwife, and will advocate for healthy pregnancies and all of that, I also don't want women to be seen only as Future Mothers of America, and that's really what I fear is happening here. It's such a fine line, you know? Do we act now when they're just sweet little guidelines and nudges in the right direction for women who plan to become mothers, or do we take action just in case those sweet little nudges are just a sign of really bad things to come?
Oh, and I'm on meds I'd NEVER think of taking when TTC. If my doctor withheld them from me because I'm of child-bearing age I'd be a wreck, and yet the minute I plan on ttc they're going down the toilet. Shouldn't I be trusted to make that decision?
Your LJ rocks; you make me think -- and with the fibromyalgia-fog I'm in lately that's a good thing. I'm going to friend you, if that's ok, so I don't forget to read you. :)
(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-12 10:30 pm (UTC)I see your points about the recommendations. I still feel that the problem was more with the spin than with the recommendations, but I'm not the one who has to live with the threat that my rights will be trampled by an over-reaching right-leaning government. I consider any country that doesn't have socialized medicine to be barely civilized; and yet, if the Bush administration were deciding what health care to pay for and what to disallow, I'd probably be even less happy with the state of things in the States.