Have Miscarriage, Go to Jail?

[Dubh Aingeal]

I didn't see this posted in another forum, but I might have missed it. If so please delete this as a dupe...

Link to Story

Imagine the following scenario.

You are at home alone at 8:00 on a Friday night.  You are 8 weeks pregnant.  You are excited about the pregnancy, but being cautious, you haven’t told anyone about it yet except your partner, your best friend, your parents, and your doctor.

All of a sudden, you begin to experience heavy cramping.  Bleeding ensues.  You realize with shock and sadness that you are probably experiencing a miscarriage.  You leave a message with your doctor’s service.  The on-call doctor calls back, offers sympathies, and advises taking pain medication or going to the hospital if the bleeding gets worse. She offers you the next available appointment for a follow-up exam - Monday at 3PM.  You accept. You are overwhelmed with grief and surprised by the intensity of physical pain involved. You call your partner and ask him to come home from his “boys night out”, sparing him the reason over the phone.  You call your best friend.  She offers to come over immediately and make you cocoa.  You cry.

You decide not to tell your parents yet; let them sleep through the night before delivering the terrible news.  Your partner comes home and you break the sad news to him.  He holds you on the couch and you both cry together.  Your best friend comes over with cocoa.  You cry some more.  Over the next few hours, you suffer pain, cramping, and intermittent bleeding.  Exhausted, you finally fall asleep in your partner’s arms around 4 AM.  You sleep until noon, and then gird yourself for the difficult call to your parents, who were so eagerly anticipating their first grandchild.

Guess what?  You just earned yourself up to 12 months in jail and a $2,500 fine.  Why?  Because you failed to call the cops and report your miscarriage within 12 hours.

True?  Not yet.  But if Delegate John Cosgrove (R-78) has his way, HB1677 will become law in a few short months, and this scenario will be reality for many women in Virginia. 

[Brenda Starrr]

WTF?!? What an ass.

[The_Dark]

You know.. for the most part I am pro-choice, I just don't see abortoin as a form of birth control. It's something that some times, some poeple have to do. But this.. this is a disgusting misuse of the Law. I can't forsee this passing Virginia's congress let alone it's State Supreme Court.

I'd like to know who really proposed this bill... not the goon it's credited too, the people pulling his strings. I would bet there is some other bill in the process that they want to take the spot light off it. This really smacks of a diversion. Then again, I'm high. So it could just be paranioa.

[Lilith]

As a person who has suffered through a miscarriage, i feel weather the bill be to take the spot light off something else or is 100% legit, the thought of being victimise by our government, haveing to share my terriable experiance with any one besides my partner/doctor befor 12 hrs expires well frankly it pisses me off.

It just hurts plain out hurts and ya know what some girls out there my be young and nieve and my not have any idea what they are going through, oh so we just cart em off to jail becouse no one has ever talked to them about such things.....

ughhhhh sorry i gues this is just a touchy subject for me and i just wanted to express i do not at all agree with this bill.

Saddened

harmony

[Onyx]

You know.. for the most part I am pro-choice, I just don't see abortoin as a form of birth control.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Where does it talk about abortion?

All I see is discussion of miscarriage.

[The_Dark]

The article. It brings up abortion as a comparrision for statistics and such. It also points out that even the pro-lifers are offended by this bill. I was just pointing out that I am one of those offened.

[nvayne]

That is just sick... why don't we just regress back to the medieval ages right now... well no wait women had more privacy then.

[The_Dark]

AS i said. I don't think this bill was put forward with any hope that it would pass. I would be willing to bet that there is another bill in the process that they want to pass but don't want the spotlight on. This bill would serve as a good diversion.

[nvayne]

AS i said. I don't think this bill was put forward with any hope that it would pass. I would be willing to bet that there is another bill in the process that they want to pass but don't want the spotlight on. This bill would serve as a good diversion.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

either that or they want to use it as a stepping stone to take away our abortion rights... put more pressure on the process, tag those of us who have had it done, maybe in the future those who have will go to jail.

of course I will leave the country before that happens.