Get your advocacy pants on, ladies! There’s yet another political issue out there that threatens to impact women’s access to critically needed medical care and assisted reproductive technologies like IVF.
There’s a proposed personhood amendment on the table in Mississippi right now that would put the lives of women at risk, limit access to standard forms of birth control, and will almost certainly make things harder for couples pursuing IVF. If the states begin to define personhood as starting at conception, IVF could be banned.
We, more than any other community, know the reality of IVF and the heart ache of losing embryos and pregnancies. We know that without IVF many of us would not be able to pursue the families we dream of and deserve. We also know the very real dangers of pregnancies that don’t go as planned. It’s imperative that we speak out against this bill.
Learn more about bill - Mississippians for Healthy Families
Initiative 26 could ban in-vitro fertilization.Leading organizations in the field of in-vitro and other assisted reproductive technologies believe this will essentially ban their work to help families have children of their own. Those organizations include the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM), Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology (SART), and RESOLVE, a national infertility group.Initiative 26 bans abortion without exceptions for rape, incest, or life of the mother.This extreme measure contains no exceptions, leaving women with medically complex pregnancies without access to life-saving treatment. For women with ectopic or molar pregnancies or unrelated illnesses like cancer, this initiative jeopardizes women’s lives. Victims of rape or incest would be forced to carry the child of their abuser.
The word on the street is that if this initiative passes in MS, similar personhood initiatives will be proposed throughout the USA.
This is about us. We have to stop this.
If you live in MS or know someone who does, please share this information with them, and encourage them to speak out against this dangerous legislation. Even if you don’t live in MS, you can sign this petition, stating your opposition to the Intitiative.
This type of legislation goes way, way, way too far, and the consequences will be dramatic and terrifying if it’s passed.
