As a part-time employee of one of Virginia's gynecologist offices that provides first-trimester abortion care, I urge the Board of Health to reconsider these burdensome and unnecessary targeted regulations of abortion providers. Our center is a proud member of the National Abortion Federation, whose Clinical Policy Guidelines provide us with an excellent standard of care to which we adhere. The high standard of care provided by women's health centers like ours is proven by their impressive safety record. Abortion is one of the safest medical procedures. Over regulation will limit access to a wide range of preventive reproductive health care services provided by women's health clinics, including life-saving cancer screenings, family planning, and sexually transmitted infection testing and treatment. Medically inappropriate and unnecessarily burdensome regulations would restrict access to essential health care services for the women of Virginia and further marginalize young, low-income, uninsured and minority women by decreasing their health care options.

Multiple physicians and ACOG themselves have come out against TRAP regulations. Please listen to the medical field and allow only evidence-based medical practices that advance the public health, not regulations aimed at closing abortion clinics.