The 40th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion falls on Jan. 22, and the March for Life, the annual anti-abortion rally in Washington, is on Jan. 25. Debate over this issue is as intense as ever yet it’s unclear that either opponents or supporters of abortion rights are winning.
A federal regulation mandating that all health insurance companies provide contraception coverage with no out-of-pocket cost to clients has prompted a sharp backlash from many religious groups – especially Catholics. It also reignited a debate over the morality of birth control that had lain dormant.
Abortion rights and health care are rarely far from the headlines, but they are especially hot topics given the furor over the decision — later rescinded — by the Susan G. Komen foundation to end most of its grants to Planned Parenthood.
In November, voters in Mississippi defeated a “personhood amendment” that would have defined a person as existing from the moment of the fertilization of an egg. If passed, Proposition 26 might have upended the debate over abortion. But the vote showed how the battle over abortion rights is increasingly taking place in the states.
Americans are confronting challenges in bioethics every day and in every venue, from hospital rooms and research labs to Congress and the Supreme Court. Developments in genetics, debates over the beginning of life and the fate of embryos, and technologies that extend and even create life are raising complex questions in medical decisions and treatment.
The anniversary of the Jan. 22, 1973, Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion always sparks discussions about this hot-button issue, and the annual March for Life in Washington is one focus of attention. But the Republican takeover of the House has also raised hopes — and concerns — that new legislation could limit abortion rights.
Two pending developments are contributing to an escalation of the nation’s long-standing debate over legalized abortion: health care reform and the anticipated release of proposals, developed by a White House task force, aimed at reducing abortion. This edition of ReligionLink provides resources to help reporters navigate the volatile issues at stake.
The killing of a Kansas abortion doctor has thrust the issue of abortion rights and abortion violence into the headlines again. George Tiller was shot to death Sunday, May 31, 2009, while serving as an usher at his Lutheran church in Wichita. A 51-year-old suspect, Scott Roeder, was apprehended later that day, and the story [...]
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