Back to Annual Meeting

Back to Annual Meeting

APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Sanford M. Cohen, JD, Deputy Director -- Domestic Litigation, Center for Reproductive Rights, 120 Wall Street, 14th Floor, New York, NY 10005, 917-637-3600, scohen@reprorights.org and Janet L. Crepps, JD, Staff Attorney, Domestic Litigation, Center For Reproductive Rights, 2108 Bethel Road, Simpsonville, SC 29681.

Reproductive health care providers' ability fully to serve their patients grows increasingly more difficult as state and federal governments enact laws and implement policies that restrict access to abortion and family planning services. Lawyers working in the field of reproductive rights will review the continuing erosion of privacy and other constitutional rights that historically have been the bases for securing a woman's ability to make decisions concerning her reproductive health from governmental intrusion. The attorneys will discuss recent federal and state legislative and policy initiatives that threaten further to impede the access of American women, especially adolescents, to reproductive health services, highlighting such examples as the FDA's refusal to approve over-the-counter status for Plan B, the Kansas Attorney General's “kiss and tell” policy, and the federal “partial-birth abortion” ban. The lawyers will also discuss whether advocates should explore international human rights documents as an additional source for protecting women's reproductive rights in the United States.

Learning Objectives: