Re: The "I Can't Believe There's No Abortion Thread" Abortion Thread
“A good compromise is when both parties are dissatisfied”
― Larry David
I got into a long discussion about abortion while having a few cocktails with my youngest daughter. She is of the thought that abortion should be readily available regardless. I am of the thought that with current birth control methods, elective abortion should be available but difficult to obtain and hardly ever performed. Here was our compromise:
1. All insurances will cover birth control (including IUD, "Morning-after pill", Norplants, BCPs, etc.) Condoms are considered a method of disease prevention not birth control. Tax breaks will be given to companies & providers that provide free birth control to any uninsured women.
2. A fetal evacuation/extraction may be performed on ANY women whose life is endangered by pregnancy or a victim of rape (this includes incest). These procedures are not considered an abortion.
3. A women may choose to have a first trimester abortion from a qualified provider for any reason.
4. All insurances would be required to cover the costs of the first lifetime abortion to 100% of the typical surgical coverage (i.e. If a women's insurance covers 50% or 80% or all of the cost of an appendectomy, it would be the same for an abortion). Second lifetime abortion would be covered at 50% unless women voluntarily agrees to strict birth control methods which would change coverage to 100%. Third abortion would be 25%
coverage unless women voluntarily agrees to strict birth control methods which would change coverage to 50%. Fourth abortion, hope your bank account is full. (Please note that medical contraindications to all available birth control methods would void the
decrease in coverage)
5. Second or third trimester abortions immediately add an additional lifetime abortion to a women's record (e.g. a first time second trimester abortions would be considered the women's second lifetime abortion and so on) unless valid rational can be provided (e.g.
Medical condition prohibits surgery in first trimester,
no available provider, etc. "I was too busy" or "I forgot" won't fly).
6. Failure of documented properly utilized birth control methods that result in a first trimester abortion will not be counted on a women's lifetime abortion record.
7. All insurances will cover 100% of delivery/prenatal/postnatal costs should baby be carried to term and put up for adoption.
By NO means is this a perfect plan and it clearly is not built to allow for every contingency out there (we were, after all, sucking down the cocktails). However, it could seemingly cut down on the number of abortions while keeping them readily available. She wasn't totally pleased with the idea but neither was I. Regardless, it will never happen. Both sides use this issue to fire up their base so any compromise is out of the question.
After reviewing what I just wrote, I think this one post probably contains more words than all of my prior posts put together.
