Women in US travel upto 300kms for abortion: Study US House votes to ban late-term abortions
New York: How far do American women need to travel in order to obtain an abortion?
A new study, billed as the first of its kind, makes those calculations stateby-state and county-bycounty, revealing some striking disparities.
In New York, the average distance is about five kilometres. At the other end of the scale, the average distance in Wyoming is about 271 kilometres.
The analysis was conducted by researchers with the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights, using 2014 data on abortion clinic locations and US Census population figures.
Nationally, according to the study, half of all women of reproductive age lived within 18 kms of an abortion clinic in 2014.
However, many women in rural areas lived much farther away; the study said 1 in 5 women nationwide would need to travel at least 69 kms to reach the nearest abortion clinic.
In the states with the longest average distance to travel — Wyoming, North Dakota and South Dakota — at least half of women of reproductive age lived more than 145 kms from the nearest clinic providing abortion services. Women in Alaska lived an average of about 15 kms from the nearest clinic, but 20 percent of women in that state would have to travel more than 240 kms. Johannesburg: The family of jailed Paralympic athlete Oscar Pistorius said Tuesday that it would pursue legal action over a coming US film about his murder of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.
In a statement, the Pistorius family said neither it nor the Steenkamps were consulted about the film, Blade Runner Killer, which is set to premiere in US on November 11.
The athlete’s family criticised the project for not being a “true reflection” of the shooting nor of Pistorius’s marathon trial which gripped the world. “The ‘film’ is a gross misrepresentation of the truth,” family said. “We will be taking legal action.” Pistorius, 30, is serving a six-year prison term for killing Steenkamp in his
house in 2013.
The researchers said the average distance increased between 2011 and 2014 for many women in Texas and Missouri, which imposed restrictions during that period that led to closure of some clinics.
At one point recently, there was only one abortion clinic operating in Missouri; there are now two, and abortion-rights advocates are pursuing legal action to expand that number. Washington: The Republican-controlled US House of Representatives has voted to ban nearly all late-term abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy, advancing a priority held by President Donald Trump’s party.
Trump is a backer of the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, and the White House has said he would sign the measure should it pass Congress and reach his desk. The bill is not viewed by the Senate as a priority, and its future in the upper chamber remains uncertain.
The legislation allows for criminal and civil penalties against doctors or others who perform the procedures, including up to five years in prison. Exceptions would be made in cases of rape, incest or where the life of the mother is at risk.
Republicans cited scientific research by pro-life organisations saying fetuses are able to feel pain from the 20th week after conception. “We cannot claim ignorance. Their pain is no longer invisible to us,” House Speaker Paul Ryan told the chamber before the vote.