2017: A Very Good Year

After the dismal Harper decade in which pro-choice forces had to fight rear-guard actions and stay alert for more sneak attacks on our rights, we racked up some significant WINS in 2017.

Locally and nationally, activists pushed the "Pro-Abortion Agenda." And won.

Here, in rough chronological order are the highlights. (If I've missed anything, please add it in the comments.)

In January, we learned that the Fetal Gore Gang lost its bully bid to put graphic ads on buses in Grande Prairie, AB.

Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada (ARCC) released its findings on government funding of anti-choice outfits, including Fake Clinics. This will pay off most satisfyingly later.

Also in January, a fun pro-choice group named Love Team Peterborough began weekly Saturday counter-protests at the Peterborough Regional Health Centre.



As expected, Donald Trump reinstated the "global gag rule," cutting off US funding from international aid agencies that support family planning and reproductive rights. The Netherlands stepped up to fill the gap with an international abortion fund. Canada joined in with a pledge of up to $20 million.

In March, Canada went further, pledging
$650 million over three years for sexual and reproductive health and rights.

A poll released in March showed Canada to be as strongly pro-choice as ever with 77% of us thinking abortion should be permitted, a little over the global average approval of abortion of 71%.

The good people of Calgary, who have had waaay more than enough of the Fetal Gore Gang, worked to get a by-law change axing a loophole the gore gang had been exploiting to hang disgusting -- not to mention dangerous -- banners over highways.

The first of the effects of ARCC's research on government funding of fetus fetishists were signalled when the Liberals banned its MPs from approving Canada Summer Jobs grants to these groups.

May witnessed the smallest ever March for Lies, with about 4,000 attending.

More from Peterborough. The pusillanimous city council had folded to threats from the Fetal Gore Gang and their ads were allowed on buses. University students raised enough dough to counter with pro-choice ads.

Back in Alberta, activists dressed as Handmaids silently protested the inclusion of Edmonton Prolife's booth at K-Days.

In August, another victory for pro-choice over the Fetal Gore Gang. A judge in BC upheld the rejection of its ads on Vancouver area buses.

The Gore Gang was busy pissing off many towns and cities last year. In response, Toronto politicians pushed for ban on its signs.

When Parliament resumed, so did the hijinks. Conservative put anti-choice MP Rachael Harder up for chair of the Status of Women Committee. ARCC deemed her "unqualified and unfit". She lost.

We noted and reported on a new sense in the media. The label "anti-choice" now had another indicator besides voting record -- support of fake clinics.

The Ontario government fulfilled its promise to enact buffer zone legislation to protect clinics, patients, and staff from harassment by side-walk bullies. Amusingly, anti-choice Conservatives, including teen fetus freak phenom Sam Oosterhoff, had better things to do on the day of the vote.

(Here's a handy list of buffer zones and court injunctions across Canada.)

In Edmonton, activists identified the disturbing links between school board trustee candidate Tyler Duce and anti-choice extremists. Candidates were also surveyed on their attitudes towards evidence-based sex ed and Gay Straight Alliances. Several progressive candidates won. Tyler Duce was trounced.

At various points in the year, Health Canada loosened its idiotic initial restrictions on the abortion pill. In November, it was announced that Canadian women would be allowed to take it up to 9 weeks' gestation. Also, various provinces decided to fully or partially fund it.

Even Saskatchewan, not usually known as a hotbed of pro-choice politics/policies, showed its mettle in 2017. When a couple of Sask Party leadership hopefuls made stupid remarks about abortion, the ensuing brouhaha immediately forced them to walk it back.

In Newfoundland and Labrador, progressive public sentiment was also evident. A school district decided that they would no longer participate in a xmas drive because the organizing charity is anti-choice/anti-LGBTQ.

I've saved the best for last. When the federal government announced the new eligibility rules for the Canada Summer Jobs program, fetus freaks went nuts. It seems that being asked to not undermine the laws of the land is a bit too much for them and their precious religious right to harass, stigmatize, and disempower whomever they don't like.

Stay tuned on this one. There will be LEGAL SUITS!!! CHARTER CHALLENGES!! Et fucking cetera.

So. It was a very good year. There's more to be done of course and we'll stay on it. But for now, we at DAMMIT JANET! are just going to bask in it and raise a glass to all the wonderful activists, researchers, and organizations who worked so hard to make these gains.

Happy New Year to all. (Except anti-choice/anti-LGBTQ dinosaurs. May your year be filled with failure and tribulation.)

Ruckus Raising Time. Again.

Up here in smug Canada -- and getting smugger by the minute as the US election approaches -- it's not often that the US has us beaten on any aspect of abortion care.

Well, they've got us all beat to hell on medical abortion.

Although many limitations remain, innovative dispensing efforts in some states, restricted access to surgical abortions in others and greater awareness boosted medication abortions to 43 percent of pregnancy terminations at Planned Parenthood clinics, the nation's single largest provider, in 2014, up from 35 percent in 2010, according to previously unreported figures from the nonprofit.

To recap, the abortion pill, aka mifepristone or RU486, was just approved in Canada in July 2015, a mere three decades after France approved it and two decades after the US did.

Juxtapose this. A year later, in July 2016 the assisted dying bill became law.

Estimated number of assisted deaths in the three months since, about 200.

Number of medical abortions in the fifteen months since the abortion pill's approval: ZERO.

There has been unconscionable fuckery associated with the abortion pill.

Looooong approval process, stupid dispensing requirements, mandated online training for physicians, weird bureaucratic hurdles for its inclusion in provincial drug plans.

But assisted dying? No such rigamarole. Law is passed. Doctors offer it. Patients want it. So.

In sensible places with universal healthcare, medical abortion is recognized for the boon it is -- both to patients and to the system. Like Australia.

But here, the regulators and politicians are kow-towing to the minuscule -- but LOUD -- anti-choice fringe who call the abortion pill "human pesticide".

It's time to do something about this idiotic situation.

An NDP MLA in Manitoba is calling for the province to cover the abortion pill.

A new resolution from St. Johns MLA Nahanni Fontaine describes the Mifegymiso pill as an essential medicine for women that should be easily accessible.

And it's not just Ms Fontaine who describes it as essential medicine. The World Fucking Health Organization listed it on its List of Essential Medicines in 2005.

Action Canada for Sexual Health and Rights has a new campaign to help persuade the powers that be to get the damned lead out and make this essential medicine available.

Check it out.

Under Take Action there are five steps you can take.

1. Write and/or meet with your local MPP, MP, Provincial/Territorial Minister of Health, and/or Federal Minister of Health.
2. Write an op-ed or pitch the story to local news outlets.
3. Take to social media! 
4. Engage your community: host an event, share information through your networks. 
5. Encourage your physician to become a medical abortion provider of Mifegymiso.

After all, provincial healthcare plans fund surgical abortion. Why would they not embrace this earlier, quicker, less expensive alternative?

Abortion Access? Another slap in the face for Canadians

Gee. You'd almost think that the gynoticians politicians don't want women to access the abortion pill, widely touted to improve access for people living in the wide swaths of remote, rural, and medically underserved Canada.

The Globe and Mail reported yesterday.

When the gold standard in medical abortion drugs finally becomes available in Canada later this year, the $300 cost of the pills will not be covered by most provincial drug plans, The Globe and Mail has learned.

The company that makes Mifegymiso has bowed out of an essential step on the path to public reimbursements for new drugs over the $72,000 price tag for a standard review of the medication’s cost effectiveness.

Provincial governments everywhere but Quebec say the company’s decision is preventing them from adding the two-drug abortion regimen to their list of publicly funded drugs, meaning women will have to reach into their own wallets or rely on private insurance to pay for Mifegymiso.

This "essential step" is called the Common Drug Review.

Today the Globe published an editorial.

Already the victims of Health Canada’s glacial bureaucracy, and of its paternalistic view of their ability to safely administer prescription drugs to themselves, Canadian women waiting to be able to use the most commonly prescribed medical abortion treatment in the world woke up to a fresh slap in the face on Monday.

The editorial recalls the ridiculously long and tortured approval process in Canada and points out that RU486, or mifepristone, has been available since 1987 in France, since 2000 in the US.

The writers also note that abortion is a common medical procedure, with surgical abortion being delivered at no cost as part of taxpayer-funded Medicare.

This latest bad news – that women will have to pay for a medical treatment to which they have a right – is the last straw. Ottawa should find a way to waive the cost of the Common Drug Review and make Mifegymiso available for free as quickly as possible.

Want to see how a Feminist PM™ handled this situation?

Like this.

Julia Gillard's last act as prime minister included signing off on cabinet approval for slashing the cost of abortion pill RU486 to as little as $12.

Listing the abortion drug on the taxpayer-funded Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) will see the price of a medical abortion in Australia drop from up to $800 to just $12 for concession card holders from August 1.

Women not eligible for concessions will pay around $70 under the PBS.

This is what a Feminist PM™ looks like.

This is what a Fake Feminist PM™ looks like.

UPDATE: Rules changed on fees for Common Drug Review during the process.

BREAKING! Feminist™ PM Declares "What's Sauce for the Goose. . ."

DAMMIT JANET! has learned that Canada's feminist Prime Minister has taken note that just about nobody is pleased with Health Canada's idiotic rigorous dispensing rules for the so-called abortion pill, Mifegymiso.

From Newfoundland and Labrador, to Prince Edward Island's pharmacists and physicians, to Manitoba and British Columbia, just about everybody who has anything to do with reproductive healthcare is pissed off.

Heck, even the Globe and Mail's editorial writers are miffed.

If this restrictive handling of the abortion pill is meant to reflect safety concerns, it is misguided. Many prescription drugs, used wrongly, have the potential to do harm and yet we trust pharmacists to dispense them, because that is their specialty. Why should Mifegymiso be any different? The damage done by preventing women from obtaining the abortion pill they need will outdo any good that comes from excessive caution about patient safety.

But if these restrictions stem from residual nervousness about easier access to abortion, even in pill form, that is completely wrong. Women have a right to this drug and they should be able to get it without further obstruction.

Among the many objections to the regime are requirements that doctors -- not pharmacists -- maintain an up-to-date supply of the drug, set up billing systems for it, and watch the patient take the first dose.

Responding to criticism that absolutely NO OTHER drug -- not even powerful, potentially lethal chemotherapy drugs -- is treated like this, feminist™ PM Trudeau reportedly said: "All righty then. We'll change the rules on erectile dysfunction drugs like Viagra. Physicians will control dispensing and patients will be required to take the pill in their presence. What's sauce for the goose should be sauce for the gander.

"Happy now?"

Um, no. We are not happy, Justin.



Inspiration from Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada's Facebook page

‪Pudgy Quast‬ Perhaps more people would understand this if men were forced to visit their Doctors to take their viagra pills in the doctor's presence rather the filling their prescriptions at a pharmacy! Women have been dispensing medication to their families forever…I think we can manage to fill a prescription and take a pill ourselves!

Totally the Same

Sad story. With bonus despicably dishonest reporting.

A Pennsylvania woman has been sentenced to up to 18 months in prison for obtaining so-called abortion pills online and providing them to her teenage daughter to end her pregnancy.

Jennifer Ann Whalen, 39, of Washingtonville, a single mother who works as a nursing home aide, pleaded guilty in August to obtaining the miscarriage-inducing pills from an online site in Europe for her daughter, 16, who did not want to have the child.

Terrible situation, but reporting is OK so far. There are some details on how difficult and expensive it would be to access abortion at a clinic.

After taking the pills, the daughter had complications, was admitted to hospital, where nosy-parkers called the police. And now here they are.

Did you catch the key point there?

The story continues.

The Pennsylvania case follows the prosecution of a Florida man who pleaded guilty to tricking his girlfriend into taking an abortion pill. He was sentenced in January to 13 years in prison and $28,500 restitution. In June, Florida toughened state law to allow for prosecutions in the death of non-viable fetuses.

Totally the same, right? Mother tries to help her daughter end unwanted pregnancy. Man tries to trick girlfriend into abortion/miscarriage.

And this is a Reuters story that has been picked up by every MSM outlet I can find.

But the Fetus Freak media has a bit of additional information: the woman got off easy.

In addition to the prison sentence, Montour County Court of Common Pleas Judge Gary Norton ordered Whalen to pay a $1,000 fine and perform 40 hours of community service upon her release.  The maximum penalty for performing an illegal abortion in Pennsylvania is seven years in prison and a $15,000 fine.

And don't forget: this is the same RWNJ demographic who goes batshit over parental consent regulations. They demand the right to give withhold consent to their children needing abortions.

These people want the right to force their children to bear children but want parents who help their children avoid bearing unwanted children to go to prison.

OK then.

Why They March: Because We're Winning

Fetus fetishists are marching again today on Parliament Hill.

This year's theme is #RU4Life, a play on the abortion drug RU486's name, which is now up for approval by Health Canada.

I find this choice perplexing.

Last year's theme was gendercide. It was in the news at the time, largely thanks to Warawa's Wank, a private member's motion condemning gender-selective abortion (as if anything could be done about it). And the issue was garnering some media attention as many "conditional pro-choicers" needed to express their ambivalence -- "I'm pro-choice but. . . "

Warawa's motion blew up real good, providing the necessary victim-fuel for last year's efforts.

But why RU486 this year?

It is but one method of abortion and not well known. It is used very early -- up to 9 weeks' gestation only -- avoiding the fetishists' beloved gore of late abortion.

While the zygote zealots try to characterize it as particularly nasty, calling it "human pesticide", and dangerous, it is safe, effective, and has been widely used around the world for nearly 30 years.

Of course antis really really hate all medical abortion. It's quick and relatively cheap. Any physician can prescribe it, making it especially useful for rural and remote access.

But what they really hate is that it's private. Women don't need to run the gauntlet of clinic harassers to get and use it.

No invigorating slut-shaming opportunities for them.

Perhaps they expected RU486 to be in the news as gendercide was last year. Last fall there were reports that Health Canada was, then wasn't, then was too considering its approval. (Now we hear that there will be no decision until 2015.)

So a miscalculation on their part?

Even so, it's hardly the barn-burner that gendercide can be in a skilful spinmeister's hands.

This is what I think. Consciously or unconsciously, the fetus fetishists recognize that they've lost the war.

Canada is a staunchly pro-choice country with 90% of us supporting abortion in all or some cases.

There is no way that abortion will be recriminalized and they know it.

So they've fallen back on fighting rear-guard skirmishes like this one on RU486 -- "this far, no further."

As more and more Canadians support abortion rights and a new generation rises up to take on the battle for equal access, the choice of this year's theme is an outright admission of defeat.

We'll continue to oppose their every effort of course, but we may be closer to total victory than we realize.



Public Service Announcement Section
First, links to counter claims that RU486 is dangerous. Some fact sheets on its safety: here, here (pdf), and my favourite, pointing out that it's safer than Tylenol.

Here's Campaign Lie's fact sheet. Note that there are five sub-heads, one given over to its "macabre lineage" to Nazi Germany -- yep, they went there -- and that one is placed higher than safety concerns. That's how little they've got in the way of actual "facts."

I like this comparison on safety. In its first year of use, Viagra was linked to 522 deaths, while fetus fetishists themselves can link RU486 to 15 deaths over nearly 30 years of use. There are risks associated with anything of course, but it's telling, isn't it, that antis show such cavalier disregard for owners of wayward willies compared to their solicitous protection for owners of vagrant vaginas.

They're planning a Tweet-fest today using the hashtag #WhyWeMarch. I'm planning on doing a little geurrilla co-option with offerings like: "Because it's mandatory at my Catholic school" and "Because my Ontario tax-payer funded Catholic school pays for a day-trip to the Hill. Day off! Yay!"

I will also be reporting, as usual, on their inflated attendance claims.

So, whether you're going to the Hill, participating in a local event (there's a rally in PEI today), snarking from your keyboard, or just watching the fun, take heart.

The good gals and guys are winning.

deBeauxOs chirping in: I'm investigating if the obnoxious gotcha that the StunTV moppet tried to spring upon the Radical Handmaids at the March4Lies made it onto their network. Will blog that tomorrow.

One step forward for Italy; two steps back for Québec?

Italian women may soon have access to RU 486 medication on a limited basis.

The Vatican and Catholic politicians today reacted with dismay to a decision by Italy's drugs agency to approve limited use of the abortion pill Mifepristone, which has been available in much of the rest of Europe since the 1990s. Senior Vatican officials said women who took the pill would be excommunicating themselves, as would doctors who prescribed it and nurses who administered it. Because of the high proportion of conscientious objectors to abortion in the Italian health service – some 70% – it is likely that use of the pill will be circumscribed.

After a reportedly heated four-hour session that ended late on Thursday, the board of the Italian pharmaceuticals agency, AIFA, voted by four to one to approve Mifepristone. But it stipulated that the pill should only be administered in hospital during the first seven weeks of pregnancy.

Unfortunately it appears that new health care regulations in Québec will make it more difficult for women to obtain a IVG (interruption volontaire de grossesse) in the future. Le Devoir and other media report that the requirements of Bill 34 which establishes understandably rigorous standards for private clinics, in the wake of medical accidents such as Micheline Charest's death in 2004, may lead to the closure of some abortion clinics. Physicians and obstetricians are lobbying the government to exclude IVG procedures from Bill 34, since in their professional opinion there is no justification to apply such requirements. Abortions practised in the first trimester are normally performed with the administration of a local anaesthetic; complex root canals are more risky than such IVG. Doctors and nurses who work in clinics and in hospitals have pointed out that first trimester abortions provided in institutional settings do not have to meet these requirements.

It's one of those events that, as with federal Bill C-484 (now-defunct), makes you wonder if a tiny group of anti-choice bureaucrats and politicians hoped to sneak these restrictions under the radar, without the benefit of public scrutiny. Polls have indicated that the majority of Canadians support access to abortion.

One inadvertently comic note about the Italian story, which includes far too much information about the Italian prime minister (emphasis ours):

For Silvio Berlusconi's government and its supporters, this was a delicate moment for any announcement bearing on sexual ethics. Recordings purportedly made by a prostitute who claims that she spent the night with Italy's 72-year-old married prime minister have focused public attention on his own apparently wide-ranging sex life. In one, a businessman who allegedly supplied women for parties at Berlusconi's home can be heard warning one of them that the prime minister never uses a condom.

That must make him a good Catholic - right?

Australian Idiocy

How the hell did this come about?

Tegan Simone Leach, 19, is believed to be the first woman charged in Queensland in nearly 50 years for organising her own miscarriage and is facing up to 14 years in jail.

Pro-abortion lobbyists are rallying in Brisbane today against the landmark test case saying it "sets an ugly precedent for the rights of women".

Ms Leach's partner Sergie Brennan, 21, who lives with his girlfriend at their Mt Sheridan home, in Cairns south, also has been charged with attempting to procure and supply drugs to procure an abortion.

In Australia, abortion is the subject of state law rather than federal law. In Queensland, it is legal only with medical supervision. (One state, Victoria, recently decriminalized the procedure and according to one nutbar, was visited by Gord's wrathful fire as a result.)

What I want to know it -- how the f*ck did police come to be involved in this?

Police allege a family member obtained the abortion pill misoprostol from a doctor in the Ukraine and smuggled it into Australia on a flight to Cairns on December 25.

The pill was then allegedly successfully used by Ms Leach to terminate her pregnancy and induce a miscarriage at 60 days.

Who ratted them out? And why?

Another supposedly damning fact is the allegation that the pair did not ask about the lawful process for obtaining an abortion. Huh? Like maybe they knew that most abortions in their state are carried out in private clinics with a minimum cost of $370.

So, good. The pro-choice forces there are taking up this cause as a definitive demonstration of the idiocy of the law. But really. Putting these kids through this, when it appears they acted responsibly . . . .

(I found an earlier report that mentions a police search of the couple's home. WTF? I'm going to try to find out more.)