Future grim for women’s reproductive health care

I am worried for my daughters and granddaughters. I am worried for all the daughters and granddaughters in the country.

The future of women’s reproductive health services looks grim under Donald Trump’s presidency, with or without the Affordable Care Act.

I am a clinician who has provided women’s reproductive health care in a clinic in the Pioneer Valley for 25 years. Over these years I have seen the number of unplanned pregnancies decline as we have increasingly been able to offer women the choice of long-acting reversible contraception.

We have also saved women’s lives with the breast and cervical cancer screenings available at the clinic. This is public health at its best, and it is under threat of ending with the likely gutting by the Trump administration of the Title X Family Planning/ Women’s Health programs, and whatever form of “Trumpcare” eventually emerges.

The week after the election of President Trump, our clinic phone rang off the hook with requests for appointments. Young women were anxious to get contraception, fearing it would become unavailable to them. Older women were anxious to have pap smears, breast exams and mammogram referrals in fear that such services would soon be eliminated. The fear is palpable, the agenda against women’s reproductive health is clear.

It is a tragic state of affairs in this country when, under the guise of a campaign promise to repeal the 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade,women of all ages may lose their access to cost-effective quality health care.

Meantime, I shall resist and persist with one pap smear, one breast exam, one implant, one IUD at a time.

Jenny Fleming

Northampton

The writer is a certified nurse midwife.

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