(no subject)

[eirias]

In Virginia, it may soon be a criminal offense to fail to report a miscarriage to the police within twelve hours - regardless of gestational age. Here is the full text of the bill.

There is an essay on this topic at some progressive sites, including the Daily Kos and Democracy for Virginia. This really should not be a progressive women's issue - this should be a family issue. I can't imagine that any family of any ideological stripe wants to spend the first few hours after an early miscarriage filling out paperwork; and as some have pointed out, strict compliance with this law would necessitate that sexually active women report each and every menstrual cycle to the authorities, just to be sure.

Thanks to leora for the heads-up.

Comments

[rms10.livejournal.com]

Dare I ask how you're supposed to prove you've had a miscarriage?

[eirias.livejournal.com]

I'm... not sure. Do you suppose they'd ask for proof?
I can't imagine they get many people filing for a death certificate for a nonexistent dead fetus.
Though, if they did, it sure would increase their paperwork. Imagine if every Virginia woman really did report every instance of menstruation...

On a similar note I'm not sure how the government would go about prosecuting someone for failing to report the loss of, say, an 8-week pregnancy. The person may not have even sought prenatal care at that point, so no one would necessarily know except herself and her spouse. I suppose in practice, the only prosecutable cases would be ones where prenatal exams had already begun. But what doctor is going to turn these women in? Isn't it something of a breach of medical ethics to call up the cops and say, "By the way, here's a list of people who got pregnant and lost the kid"?

The list of information wanted on the form was also ludicrous - including things like sex and size of the fetus. What if you thought you were pregnant but it turns out the "fetus" was just some type of uterine aberration (http://www.med.uwo.ca/ume/radiology/year3/OBGYN/obgynfull.htm)? Not like a mass of molar tissue has a sex. The whole thing is just bizarre and clearly designed by a guy who's had precious little experience with pregnancy.