To Whom It May Concern:

My entire family urges you to protect women's health care and end the temporary regulations put on women's health centers.  These regulations threaten the continued availability of safe and legal abortions in many locations throughout Virginia.  Requirements that have no medical benefit will reduce, and possibly eliminate altogether, patient access to health care.  Wealthy women will take their ‘choice’ options out of state or to high-end private and exclusive facilities.  These regulations are simply more burdens to health care for patients, and many of the women who go to the women's health centers are already significantly financially burdened.

Regardless of your stance on abortion, the fact remains it is legal in this country.  Trying to legislate a particular viewpoint leads to ‘back-alley’ and dangerous remedies for poorer women.  Abortion is one of the safest and most common medical procedures, and overregulation of women's health centers will limit access not only to a safe and legal procedure, but it will also limit access to cancer screenings, family planning, and STI testing and treatment. 

Please look only at medical fact and scientific evidence when you consider these regulations.  There is no medical benefit to these stringent regulations or unnecessary invasive proceeds.

For those who say there is too much government, it seems that some of the same people believe that more government is needed to regulate women and their bodies.  Be reasonable and rational and look to medical benefits, not political benefits.