Abortion Debate Falls Short for Teens
Dr. George Tiller was murdered while ushering at his church on Sunday May 31, 2009. His death is tragic for several reasons one of which is that a voice to advocate for the needs of women has been lost. This tragedy will once again raise the debate over abortion rights in the United States.
It will most likely be presented as it usually is, a pro-choice vs. pro-life debate. President Obama while giving a commencement speech at Notre Dame, a Catholic institution of higher learning proposed that there must be some common ground for which these two passionate sides can come together to address this issue. At least, make some progress.
As a clinician who sees teens, I see this dilemma within the context of those whose voice is not heard. They have no right to vote and many of them are thankful that those who did gave them confidentiality, which allows access to confidential care without approval from a guardian or parent. Because I do preventive health, I am in the position to talk about how we prevent the dilemma of this choice, keep vs. abort. How do we give the option of prevention before the consequence of pregnancy that should be one of happiness and not worry and stress? Abstinence is surely one of those ways, but birth control is a way to catch those who have made the decision to become sexually active.
Birth Control has taken on a different meaning than “the pill” that became very popular in the sixties and seventies. Today’s teens and young adults have a variety of choices that can help them prevent pregnancy with almost 100% guarantee since these methods are efficient despite human error. The pill, which must be remembered daily; the patch that must be remembered weekly; the ring that must be remembered monthly and the shot which must be remembered every three months are all wonderful forms of birth control, but they require that teens remember. Implanon, which lasts three years, replaced the norplant and has revolutionized the options that we can provide teens in the way of confidential, reliable and easily reversible methods of birth control. Only the intrauterine device (I.U.D.) trumps implanon with either five or ten years of confidential, reliable and easily reversible birth control. These methods serve to get teens out of their youth and young adulthood well on the way to better opportunities that hopefully prevent the “accidents” of ignorance and youth. There will always be the exceptional case of rape and incest, but even with these vile methods of conception long term methods leave the “victim” safe from pregnancy.
It is time for change and we have seen the seeds of change planted for the past several months. It is time we made this one more area we can hope to see a change in America. It is time we asked that the abortion issue stand up for teens and in doing so stand up for all women instead of falling short of their needs to prevent the dilemma of having to make the choice.
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