The Atlantic Wire reports that Virginia Governor and professional asshole Bob McDonnell is backing down from his “state-mandated rape” plan:
It is clear that in the majority of cases, a routine external, transabdominal ultrasound is sufficient to meet the bills stated purpose, that is, to determine gestational age. I have come to understand that the medical practice and standard of care currently guide physicians to use other procedures to find the gestational age of the child, when abdominal ultrasounds cannot do so. Determining gestational age is essential for legal reasons, to know the trimester of the pregnancy in order to comply with the law, and for medical reasons as well.
Thus, having looked at the current proposal, I believe there is no need to direct by statute that further invasive ultrasound procedures be done. Mandating an invasive procedure in order to give informed consent is not a proper role for the state. No person should be directed to undergo an invasive procedure by the state, without their consent, as a precondition to another medical procedure.
Too little, too late, as far as I”m concerned. This dipshit has no place in public police, or in civilized company.
Yeah, I’m appalled that anyone ever thought that was a good idea. “Whoops, it turns out we don’t have to stick an enormous wand up your vagina to see how far along the pregnancy is!” They should’ve done the research before trying to pass this shitty legislation.
I find the whole thing strange because this is the standard of practice at the women’s health center I used to work at. The office performed abortions as well as full obstetrical and gynecologic care, lamaze classes and intro to newborn massage techniques. We used a vaginal probe ultrasound to determine size and dates in all of our patients who had not previously had an ultrasound for size and dates of the fetus in the womb. I understand that if you’ve already had a size/dates US done then you don’t need another one, but I’m still not quite sure why this man (who is obviously an idiot and shouldn’t be in any sort of office due to his complete ignorance and lack of even trying to educate himself) caused such a big riot by saying that an ultrasound via intravaginal probe must be done. It’s a procedure that is very routinely done anyway.
Joy,
The point is he wanted to mandate it for anyone who wanted to obtain a legal procedure. This wasn’t about standards of care or anything like that, it was about him saying “Oh, you want to avail yourself of your legal rights? Sure, right after I jam this up your vag.” He’s a pig, and if I had my way he’d be indicted for this shit.