Choice News May 28th 2010

Supreme Court Watch

Memos from Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan's clerkship with Justice Thurgood Marshall express concern that a conservative court would be a detriment to women's rights.

Stateside

Oklahoma Gov. Brad Henry vetoed a bill that would have banned insurance coverage for abortion except under limited circumstances in the new insurance exchanges. This is the fourth veto Gov. Henry has issued on abortion-related legislation this year; the last three vetoes were overridden by the Republican-controlled legislature.

Contraception

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that the oral contraceptive pill is the most popular form of birth control worldwide.

A report from the CDC also found that women and their male partners are increasingly using male condoms when they have sex for the first time. This trend may explain the decline in the teenage birth rate over the past few decades.

Time Magazine reports that emergency contraception (also known as the morning-after pill) is gaining in popularity among urban India's increasingly educated women.

Other News of Note

New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof calls the Catholic Church's excommunication of a nun who was part of a hospital's ethics committee that voted to allow a woman to have a life-saving abortion "morally obtuse."

Writing for the Nation, Lynn Harris reports on the disturbing trend of reproductive coercion, when a man tries to force his female partner to become pregnant as a means of control. Harris argues that addressing this kind of intimate partner violence must be a part of the strategy for reducing teen pregnancy rates.

Teen pregnancy rates in Canada have dropped by 37% over the last decade. Researchers point to sexual health education and increased access to birth control as part of the reason for the decline.

In response to public outcry, the American Academy of Pediatrics has pulled back from its recommendation, issued last month, that doctors be given permission to perform a ceremonial pinprick or nick on girls if it would prevent their families from sending them abroad for female genital mutilation.