So treat it carefully at all times, because you don’t want to be charged with endangering official government property:
New federal guidelines ask all females capable of conceiving a baby to treat themselves — and to be treated by the health care system — as pre-pregnant, regardless of whether they plan to get pregnant anytime soon.
Among other things, this means all women between first menstrual period and menopause should take folic acid supplements, refrain from smoking, maintain a healthy weight and keep chronic conditions such as asthma and diabetes under control.
No more wild parties girls. No risky sports like rock climbing, either. And definitely don’t run too much as that depresses your hormone levels and plays havoc with your menstrual cycles. Just take your vitamins and keep your vagina safe for your husband (or husband to be).
Does anybody know how much the medications cost these days to keep asthma under control? Singular is around $90.00 a month and I’ll probably get the Advair today and I have no idea what that costs……and how many of us don’t even have insurance?
I know how much it costs! About $130 for 60 doses (2x a day)
Sounds like a Bob Casey Democratic Party idea.
Speaks for itself.
I’m assuming that pre-pregnant males are not expected to refrain from horseback or motor-cycle riding, drug use, alcohol consumption, tighty-whities or masturbation.
No masturbation?!! What will I do with all my free time?!!
Yeah, but I’m more concerned about the tighty whiteys, myself. :<)
You’d think that by now I would have developed the ability to defend against this kind of bullshit, but this rocked me. Goddess help us!!
Why can’t my health just be important because its me?! Why does its importance have to be tied to being ready to have a healthy baby – no matter whether I want one???
I read this last night and I am still too dumbfounded to make a coherent reply.
Of course, people’s health is important, but not because they are capable of making babies.
If they are so worried about health of women, they would provide every woman health insurance that fully covered all medical exams, etc. The problem with infant mortality in the U.S. is that many women do not have the means to access pre-natal care and many are forced to carry pregnancies to term that they don’t want.
Argh. Old, white men are behind this. I’m sure of it.
This misadministration is amazingly good at that sort of thing.
I should know better than to try to spell something complicated like “unfunded” just after I wake up.
Shouldn’t it be, “All your womb are belong to us?”
I was thinking the same thing.
I’m particularly delighted with how this covers the time from the onset of menses to menopause.
Um, it is quite common for nine year olds to get their periods these days.
Sheesh. Maybe it is time to leave the country before I lose my human status.
I’m sorry, you must first obtain a separate passport for your uterus and permission to take it outside the U.S.
If my daughter and I flee together, and she gets her period on the way to the airport, does that make her contraband?
Quite possibly. And due to the presence of blood-sniffing airport dogs, she may be required to get a mandatory injection of folic acid and to register her newly fertile womb with US authorities.
If we have to take care of our bodies for the government because we might have babies…does that mean we get government healthcare from menses to menopause?
Just askin….
Her uterus belongs to Jesus’ General.
Um, did anyone actually read the article? The recommendations came in a report from CDC, with a focus on lowering infant mortality:
What I don’t see here is a link to the report, nor is there a link in that particular article. Maybe some of you have actually read the full report? Or disagree with the common sense recommendations in that box?
Specious, misleading reportage is not limited to the f*cking WaPo now, is it?
I read the article and much of it is definitely common sense stuff with the aim to lower our abyssmal infant mortality rate.
What would really help is universal health care, not classifying all fertile women as being constantly pre-pregnant.
I think we all agree the statistics are bad:
And that the recommendations for preventive health care that you posted in your box are technically sound.
What makes people’s alarms start going off are the political ramifications regarding whether this nation is going to treat women as “walking wombs” given in the viewpoint in the headline and first paragraph of the WaPo story:
The concern is that you start down a slope where “recommendations” become social norms (honestly, ask yourself: If you see a pregnant woman drinking or smoking, what are your first thoughts?) which in time become laws. And both social norms and laws are powerful but at times very crude instruments for bringing about a better world – in this case free of birth defects – which everyone agrees upon.
Do you think it coincidental that the Torontonian Margaret Atwood wrote much of The Handmaid’s Tale while a visiting professor at the University of Alabama?
Do we start banning “pre-pregnant” women from a range of jobs because of workplace chemical exposures? You can see why the concern at the implications of the guidelines – which as you say, are good common sense preventive health concepts – when they are coupled with a certain mindset prevalent in the ruling party today.
Interestingly, this mindset could have all kinds of unintended consequences for the right, as the effects of environmental and workplace exposures are often much more significant on fetuses and infants than adults – which would mean industry would have to meet stricter pollution limits to protect the 50% of the population that are “pre-pregnant” and their potential “precious cargo.” (A larger pool of potential receptors of pollution will drive the risk assessments models of EPA, CDC, etc towards requiring lower pollution limits.)
And what happens when these same chemicals are shown to impact sperm as well? And will jockey shorts be banned and boxers mandatory?
So are they going to ban women from “dangerous” work environments because they might get pregnant? NO more female cops or firefighters because heck, they might be pregnant and not know it. Or, perhaps we should simply fire all women who work in factories because, you know, they might get pregnant. In fact, it might be best if we keep women home alltogether because this is a dangerous world and we wouldn’t want to harm any potential babies.
here goes.
The advice at face value seems sensible.
In context, however (with anti-choice policies, fighting a vaccine for HPV because some nutcase thinks it encourage promiscuity, now trying to criminalize birth control, etc.), and we sound like we’ve taken another step toward Romania. Classifying all women as “pre-conception”? Not only is it creepy but it’s an HMO-type solution (pushing prevention) when it doesn’t get at the underlying/structural reasons why the infant mortality rate in this country is so high.
If you’re poor, prevention will only take you but so far.
There’s lots of things we could do to bring down the infant mortality rate, but the nutjobs running our country don’t “believe” in them and think it’s the work of the devil.
The “guidelines” are at once regressive and ineffectual. That’s why this “advice” is attacked and rightfully so.
The advice at face value seems sensible.
That would have been a good place for you stop. If you read the article (lousy as it is) you will find the researchers share your concerns, and have included causes – including lack of medical insurance – leading to the unneccessarily high infant mortality rate.
I fail to see how any of those “guidelines” are “regressive” or “ineffectual”. They simply restate the type of advice given to prospective mothers through the offices of Planned Parenthood, and family doctors for the last 30 years.
You’re shooting the messenger without reading the full message.
That would have been a good place for you stop.
I see you’ve had your recommended daily allowance of Cat Chow. Congratulations. I wouldn’t want that to interfere with assumptions you’ve made, including the fact that I haven’t read the article.
I don’t take anything at face value. Most adults don’t.
Taken with others, that direct quote sums up the basis for the guidelines in the report. As I wrote above, fairly straightforward, common sense approach. Even in the context of the current administration.
You have taken a “teaser” headline on a weblog, referring to an article in the WaPo, which itself refers to a report by the CDC, and extrapolated enough information to dismiss the credibility of the research and their guidelines. (Briefly described here in another WaPo article).
I should have written my above comment as “re-read the article”, but the balance of my response stands.
My previous comments stand as well. Defining women as “pre-pregnant” is gimmicky and quite frankly, as stupid as it is offensive. Who goes around defining herself as “pre-pregnant”? It’s ludicrous.
It is also not getting at the real problem.
Too many pregnancies in this country unplanned? That’s because we can’t and in fact aren’t being allowed to speak frankly about basic biology, much less getting access to birth control.
Not to mention the utter lack of pre- and post-natal care and support for too many women.
And at the end of the day, defining me as talking uterus is just sick. So…should I never have a sip of wine as it may impair my impending status as an actual pregnant woman? Should I have charges brought against me if I knowingly eat tuna, given the reports of elevated mercury levels?
What else should I or any other “pre-pregnant” woman do, lest we stupidly endanger the fetus?
Words have meaning. I’m surprised that you pretend that they don’t.
You have taken a “teaser” headline on a weblog, referring to an article in the WaPo, which itself refers to a report by the CDC, and extrapolated enough information to dismiss the credibility of the research and their guidelines. (Briefly described here in another WaPo article).
I read the WAPo article.
The reason we have a high maternal and infant mortality rate is because we have the highest poverty rate in the industrialized world and that poverty is feminized. Infantalizing women and insisting that everyone who menstrates is ‘pre-pregnant’ and should live like a female member of the LDS church is not going to improve those statistics one bit. Neither is lowballing the number of uninsured women to a mere 17 million.
Love,
your cheap labor force
Please read the referenced CDC report, titled Recommendations to Improve Preconception Health and Health Care – United States [.pdf]. Note that the term “preconception”, not “pre-pregnant”, is used throughout. As is too often the case, the writer @ WaPo was lazy, irresponsible, and as should be apparent, innacurate.
As someone who believes in universal healthcare, (and a national “living wage”), and with a close relative working in a NICU, I am – like both of you – fully aware our Country suffers extreme disparity in delivery of healthcare services.
And as is too often the case on “weblogs”, this “conversation” resulted from the failure of the writer to include a direct link/reference to the report in her original article, compounded by Steven’s failure to likewise take the five minutes I did to find the report.
The valid points you have both raised are covered in the report.
“They simply restate the type of advice given to prospective mothers through the offices of Planned Parenthood, and family doctors for the last 30 years.”
Sure, if you are white, English speaking, and preferably at least middle class, you are are correct. I certainly considered my health with respect to the fact that I did want a kid some day. But, this is simply not true for many, if not most women. Planned Parenthood tries, but it simply does not have the funds for even providing birth control, let alone comprehensive care for female health for all women today, let alone for even a fraction of women in poverty.
Umm, I get the feeling I may be wading into a minefield, but maybe people are overreacting here. It seems to me that the idea here is:
Many pregnancies are unplanned.
Many unplanned pregnancies encounter problems because the woman wasn’t taking folic acid or what have you.
There are two ways to ameliorate this: better planning and better health care. Clearly this policy ignores the planning approach, and that is a legitimate flaw IMHO, approach, but encouraging more folic acid supplements and less smoking are things that are generally beneficial to health in the first place.
Perhaps I am allowing too much of a benefit of the doubt especially given the lack of mention of contraception, but I don’t have a huge problem with this policy beyond the taboo-contraceptive attitude, which is pretty par for the course with this administration and not at all surprising. If doctors were not concerned about sufficient vitamin intake, smoking, overweight, diabetes, and/or asthma, they’re not really doing their job anyway, no matter whether pregnancy is a possibility or even whether you’re male or female. It occurs to me that if there were more of a hidden agenda aspect to this, the forces behind it would try to cloak these recommendations in a more general way than they did, i.e. saying that everybody should do this…
Then again, I’m just a guy, so what do I know?
‘Tis the dehumanization, my friend.
This is defended in the article as needed to reduce the U.S.’s infant mortality rate, which, as the article points out, ranks high among industrialized nations.
So are we to conclude that “pre-conception care” is the norm among the other industrialized nations?
Somehow I doubt it.
You don’t suppose there might be other disparities between the U.S. and other nations, disparities that have something to do with getting access to health care in the first place, that might have something to do with it?
Nope. Better to blame those bad, bad women for failing to take seriously their responsibilities as potential child-bearers.
I also liked the line about how this needs to be done in a way that doesn’t “scare” women. Not “offend.” Not “outrage.” “Scare.”
Oh, and if asthma is a concern, maybe they should stop doing shit like this. I’m not asthmatic (nor a “mom-to-be-someday-maybe”), but I’m having trouble breathing right now.
If they’re concerned about asthma in the “pre-pregnant” how about some air pollution control laws with teeth?
Aren’t you aware that such laws would only put a burden on industry that would increase the cost of manufacturing anti-asthmatic medication, which increase would have to be passed on to the consumer?
I think that’s how it’s supposed to go.
So are we to conclude that “pre-conception care” is the norm among the other industrialized nations?
Hardly. I mean Cuba does a better job. I think the difference is that in Cuba and more civilized cultures public policy isn’t dictated by religious right wackos like Bob Casey and Concerned Women for America (and who will those idiots endorse in the PA senate race? They’ll endorse Santorum, that’s who)
I also liked the line about how this needs to be done in a way that doesn’t “scare” women. Not “offend.” Not “outrage.” “Scare.”
Ah, you caught that. Women don’t like to listen to a ‘pre-pregnancy’ lecture from some wackjob because it scares them? The utter inappropriateness of it scares them, not to mention being reduced to the status of a talking uterus and having to pay for it.
I don’t know…. Girls in Russia aren’t supposed to sit on the floor so they don’t freeze their ovaries…
I agree w/ those that say there is merit to preconception care. In fact, we all might be healthier by trying to live as if we were pre-pregnant. And yes, having access to primary health care is part of that equation. However, it is how this information is being delivered, how it will be used, and for what purposes that is key. We all know too well how things go down w/ this admin.
For comparison, this is what the Public Health Agency of Canada has to say about preconception care:
Hi Olivia. Thanks for putting this up as it points up the real difference in the attitude or mindset between how the whole family or both the man and women involved is included in the overall health care towards healthy families including women not yet pregnant. As opposed to the creepy wording and slant of the above article which gives you the feeling we are only supposed to stay healthy so we can make babies. I read the article last night and thought maybe I was just tired and overreacting but it sounds just as creepy today as it did last night.
Yeah — the idea I was getting at was that preconception care is all about getting people to think of their health — and that really transcends reproduction imo. Many of the recommendations for PC are things that we would all – men and women – benefit from, like healthy eating, physical activity, clean environments, less stress, supportive communities, good health/wellness care. It’s less of a womb issue to me, and more of a human issue.
The WAPO article is scare-mongering, sensationalistic stuff that fits beautifully w/ the current climate. That’s what freaks us all out. But what’s new right.
It’s good to see ya, it’s been a while. 🙂
Since she hasn’t dropped in for the discussion, y’all might want to click over the border and see what Catnip has to say about this – as if you couldn’t guess, LOL! 🙂
LOL…aside from not bleeding every month, one of the best things about being pregnant was I finally got my good for nothing husband to clean the damn litter box for a change! :>)
that folks currently in the government would love to take advantage of.
For example, certain members of the government would love to get rid of parts of employment law that prohibit discrimination based on gender. Voila — we can’t hire women of childbearing age because we have to protect the potential fetus, especially in that 52-day range when the woman doesn’t know she’s pregnant. I mean, what if a firefighter was unknowingly pregnant and had a miscarriage while carrying someone out of a burning building? Horrors…
Yeah, it sounds like common sense, but in this era of America Uber Alles, it also sounds a lot like telling women they’re nothing more than baby-making machines. What’s next, pulling resources from elderly women since they’re no longer able to contribute progeny to the State? And what about those of us who’ve chosen to remain childless…I guess we’re going to be on the next “enemies list”…
And if we’re talking about health, why not tell the men to take care of their health too — we want them to be around to support that future progeny so the kids won’t have to be supported by the State. They also have to maintain maximum sperm health to produce as healthy a Master Race as possible…
Okay, okay, you men can say I’m overreacting…but women have fought long and hard (if you’ll pardon the sexual innuendo) to be seen as people in their own right…and it looks like we’re going to be taking a massive step backwards…