Last week I had the privilege of speaking at your monthly meeting and I enjoyed my time with you immensely. The focus of my remarks was the effect of our current political times on reproductive health care and rights around the world. My goal for our time together was to be able to brief already engaged folks and spark at least one issue that as individuals, you would be willing to take on and work towards making a difference in our world.

We started with international issues. I believe that the US has been a bully with our financial aid for family planning services in developing countries. We have attached strings and unrealistic rules to all of our assistance programs, using the individual moralities of politicians. The result causes real harm to women and their families by restricting family planning services to those who need them most. Last week congress refused to fund a UN program to assist women with complications of child birth while restricting their access to control their fertility. The administration also continues to require unfair assurances from developing country organizations that tie their hands in providing out effective family planning and HIV/AIDS programs. Abstinence programs work no better here at home than they do in other countries.

The national challenges have been constant throughout this administration but somehow, as a whole, are flying under the radar screen. This could be accounted for by our distractions with war and national security. We can start with the South Dakota types of laws that are sweeping the country. It's been a wake-up call for all of us and what prompted Bob to invite me to speak. These are either direct challenges to the Roe decision or trigger laws ready and in place if the court strikes down Roe. California had a ballot initiative last fall addressing teens and abortion. Those opposed to teen access lost and now are running another ballot measure this fall. Oregon is doing the same. The core of reproductive rights and access to services has played out at the FDA with science vs. politics and emergency contraception, at the CDC with medically accurate information on condoms for their web site, with appointments of judges and agency directors, as well as policies that affect our military personnel's access to safe medical care or women who are the victims of sexual assault. This administration has an agenda that they are willing to push no matter how irrational and dangerous.

Here in Utah our most recent legislative session reinforced our elected lawmakers' disregard for reproductive rights or access to services. Again this year we had two bills restricting access to abortion and at the same time a refusal to even hear a bill to create contraceptive equity in insurance plans to assist family's access to birth control. Recent studies reveal Utah in the bottom 10 of states on comprehensive sex education or respect of reproductive rights. Neither as a nation nor a s a state are we willing to entertain legislation for prevention of unintended pregnancy, to promote women's health, or invest in effective programs to curb the rising numbers of teens and adults with STDs.

I cautioned as we neared the end of my prepared remarks that there are many other issues where we are making no progress. Services for teens are fraught with so much controversy that we struggle to reach them with effective information and services. Those opposed to reproductive rights and services are using every opportunity to eliminate access to services for those most vulnerable. A report released last week revealed the growing gap between the rich and poor in access to family planning services to reduce the need for abortion. An anti-choice "think tank" is pushing legislation to grant personhood to fetuses, paving the way to outlaw abortion. Many of these issues are addressed in June's Atlantic magazine and an article "The Day After Roe."

We also discussed the culture wars and how individual values imposed on others can cause grave harm. When a pharmacist refuses to fill a reproductive health prescription for emergency contraception or even birth control pills it can change a woman's whole life. If she can't get to another pharmacy or her prescription is confiscated or she is humiliated and stopped in her tracks an unintended pregnancy could be the result. There are journalists who are now suggesting the policies of this administration are causing more abortions than they are preventing.

Just thinking about all the issues and work to be done could be overwhelming if I didn't believe that good people like you were willing to take on some of these challenges. A letter to the editor makes a difference. Helping others to know the issues and calling the politicians on their bad votes or policies is critical for their education. Assisting in the campaign work to elect better lawmakers goes a long way to change the tide.

I ask each of you to find a cause in this presentation that you can get behind. Volunteer for Planned Parenthood or another organization working on reproductive rights. It will take all of us to keep reproductive rights and services safe and legal in these political times.

Thanks for listening. Thanks for being who you are.

--Karrie Galloway, CEO
Planned Parenthood Association of Utah