Where Do You Get a Pre-Abortion?

The Washington Post reports:

New federal guidelines ask all females capable of conceiving a baby to treat themselves -- and to be treated by the health care system -- as pre-pregnant, regardless of whether they plan to get pregnant anytime soon.

Among other things, this means all women between first menstrual period and menopause should take folic acid supplements, refrain from smoking, maintain a healthy weight and keep chronic conditions such as asthma and diabetes under control.

Comments

[Russ 2000]

Nothing like infantilizing women until they're in their late 40's.

[Jennifer]

Y'all can kiss my fertile but childless ass.

[Ron Hardin]

Etymologically unsound.

``Pregnant'' already has the ``pre.'' It's actually pre-gnant, before born.

Other interesting words that turn out to make sense : helico-pter , a-mnesia.

[Isaac Bartram]

I'm getting the feeling that if I want serious news I'm going to have to stick to reading The Onion.

[NoStar]

Jennifer, thank you.

[SR]

"Women should also make sure all vaccinations are up-to-date and avoid contact with lead-based paints and cat feces, Biermann said." (From the article)

Is this part of a secret plot to reduce the number of crazy cat ladies?

[van]

Wow, the Health Nazis have gone all Handmaid's Tale on us.

As a woman of reproductive age, I guess I better sell my house due to the lead-based paint hazard. And since I'm single and have no one to clean the litter box for me, I'm going to have to get rid of my cats. It's for the good of society and/or the public health statistics. I can accept the loss and pain.

[SR]

"Y'all can kiss my fertile but childless ass."

Have you considered mailing your un-used eggs to the CDC?

[van]

I am NOT CRAZY!!!

[SR]

I couldn't have timed that better if I'd tried.

[Jennifer]

I don't know what infuriates me more--Federal guidelines treating all pre-menopausal women as infants, or Federal guidelines advising all pre-menopausal women to think of ourselves first and foremost as baby-makers.

[bubba]

Being male, I'm free to let my diabetes and asthma run rampant.

[Russ 2000]

They might also want to check what unhealthy lifetsyles influence one to name their children "January".

[Karen]

I look forward to the corresponding instructions from the feds to men to avoid booze, marijuana, saunas, unprotected sex, and tight underwear so that they can keep their sperm counts high enough for conception. After all, each egg needs a sperm.

[S.R. Chamberlain]

Karen, you forgot Mountain Dew. Although frankly, I think that's all that stands between us and a super race spawned entirely by computer programmers.

[maej]

How could they leave out a warning for all women to avoid "raw milk, supposedly pasteurized fluid milk, cheeses (particularly soft-ripened varieties), ice cream, raw vegetables, fermented raw-meat sausages, raw and cooked poultry, raw meats (all types), and raw and smoked fish".

At the very least they should have insisted that all women of childbearing age stop screwing jackasses.

[van]

Seriously, SR. In a matter of seconds, the order would've been reversed and everything would have been RUINED.

[happyjuggler0]

No more Ladies Night. Can't have those incubators getting a bit tipsy now can we?

[Minerva Oblongata]

The above comment is a good segue into my pitch (again) for the baby incubator idea....just stir occasionally.

[Minerva Oblongata]

The above comment is a good segue into my pitch (again) for the baby incubator idea....just stir occasionally.

[Minerva Oblongata]

The above comment is a good segue into my pitch (again) for the baby incubator idea....just stir occasionally.

[Karen]

SRC: Consider Mountain Dew added to the list. Also horseback riding and living in hot climates (heat damages sperm apparently.)

Seriously, why issue instructions only to women? This manages to insult everyone: women are nothing more than wombs and men are entirely expendable. Ugh. Please someone, get these people laid or drunk or something. Find them nice, time-consuming hobbies so they'll leave us alone.

[Captain Holly]

I guess chocolate is a big no for Valentine's Day next year, then.

[CDC guy w/a Daiquiri]

But Karen, pestering you is more than a fun hobby, it's a fulltime job!

[Ellie]

"Women should also make sure all vaccinations are up-to-date and avoid contact with lead-based paints and cat feces, Biermann said." (From the article)

Is this part of a secret plot to reduce the number of crazy cat ladies?

Risk of toxoplasmosis, I think.

Don't we lesbians get an exemption, though? If I have to suffer the guilt of straining every marriage in America, I should at least get the fun of being a folic-acid-deficient fatass.

[linguist]

The above comment is a good segue into my pitch (again) for the baby incubator idea....just stir occasionally.

Only if you want to demonstrate how that method might result in triplets 🙂

[Larry A]

So now life really does begin at 40.

OTOH sooner or later someone is bound to notice that the most effective method for improving the health of both mother and child during pregnancy is to encourage women to have babies in the late teens/early 20s instead of the late 30s/early 40s. Do away with the "wait until marriage" idea altogether.

[Mutt]

Next announcement. All people who have not, as adults, accepted Jesus Christ as their personal lord and savior, should be considered "unborn again." Based on an average life expectancy (or afterlife gestation period) of approximately 80 years, this means that you can kill the "unborn again" without penalty if they are between the ages of eight and thirty-two, in a hospital if they are between thirty-two and fifty-six, but not at all between ages fifty-six and eighty.

Of course this creates problems for the Social Security system, which is precisely why private retirement accounts are so attractive.

Public health advisories remain the same for both U.S. citizens and the "unborn again." Everyone is pre-dead, and therefore should live in such a manner as to leave a pleasant corpse and a pure soul. Don't have sex with prostitutes or eat the fries at McDonald's. If you must smoke, use gunsmoke or tailpipe emissions, which are both perfectly safe; not tobacco, marijuana or crack, which stink in the nostrils of the Almighty. Ride your bicycle, but drive your car to get there. Live like any part of you that won't fit in a normal casket will be cut off without anesthetic on your deathbed. Smile and wear lots of makeup, especially over bruises. Sleep in a narrow bed with a lid. Bundling is also a good practice.

[sally]

The cat litter thing drives me crazy.

Toxoplasmosis is a non-issue for most people. It feels like a brief, mild stomach flu - you could easily have it and not know it. It is a bigger risk for pregnant women - but a very small one. Something like a whopping 0.4% of pregnant women in the U.S. acquire it, and only a small percentage of them will pass it on to the baby.

There is almost no risk from the litter box if your cat is an entirely indoor cat, as long as you don't feed it raw meat. The cats get it from eating contaminated prey.

If your cat is an outdoor cat, it's actually a GOOD idea to mess with the litter box before you get pregnant. If you acquire toxoplasmosis before conception, you develop antibodies - which protects any babies you might have, forever and ever.

Not scooping the litter box is an easy (and fun!) thing that most preggos can do and it isn't a bad idea. But to tell all women, ever, to avoid the litter box for all time is just plain crap.

(I couldn't resist the pun. Sorry.)

[sage +P]

I like the "maintaining a healthy weight" part. Who wants to look at a behemoth?

[sage +P]

I like the "maintaining a healthy weight" part. Who wants to look at a behemoth?

[mediageek]

Great. Yet another reason for me to loathe my room mate's fricken' cats.

[Karen]

Sally says what my ob/gyn (the marvelously named Dr. Casanova) said. He also said that digging in flowerbeds could give you toxo, because feral cats would have, er, deposited a source of the infection in said bed. I note that these guidelines don't warn the pre-pregnant about digging weeds or planting flowers.

[Jennifer]

You know, if these guidelines said something like "women should take extra calcium to avoid osteoporosis later in life" I wouldn't be offended at all, just as I wouldn't be offended by "men should do whatever the hell it is you're supposed to do about your prostates". But for the government to issue specific guidelines on what women should do to be the best damned baby-makers we can be, especially at a time when access to contraception and abortion is decreasing in many parts of the country. . . fuck each and every last one of these bastards with a rusty toxoplasmosis-infected gardening implement.

[thoreau]

folic acid supplements, refrain from smoking, maintain a healthy weight and keep chronic conditions such as asthma and diabetes under control

OK, what I don't get is that they also recommend these measures for everybody else. It doesn't seem fair to me that fertile women get an extra dose of nannying.

[mountainman]

So, I wonder... is it possible to be "just a little bit pre-pregnant"? hmmm, the possibilities....

[JD]

...just as I wouldn't be offended by "men should do whatever the hell it is you're supposed to do about your prostates".

Uh...I believe that would be "ejaculate a lot", actually. But you're probably not offended by that anyway.

[Paul]

The U.S. infant mortality rate is higher than those of most other industrialized nations -- it's three times that of Japan and 2.5 times those of Norway, Finland and Iceland, according to a report released last week by Save the Children, an advocacy group.

Compare with:

Smoking in Norway, 2005
One out of four smokes daily
About one out of four people aged 16-74 smoked daily in 2005. In addition, approximately 11 per cent smoked occasionally.

Every year Statistics Norway conducts surveys about the use of tobacco. The 2005 survey shows that 25 per cent of the population aged 16-74 are daily smokers. The proportion was 26 per cent in 2004.

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT: STOP
WE WANT YOU TO STOP
PLEASE PLEASE STOP

[Stephanie]

prompts nurses to ask women, "...do you plan to become pregnant in the next year? And if not, what birth control are you using?"

I don't plan to get pregnant in the next year and I don't use birth control. If my female partner gets me pregnant, I'll probably name the baby "Jesus".

Stupid heterosexist jerks.

[The Man]

Attention:

All pre-pregnant women who intend on following through: Jesus loves you. Please remove your footwear and report to the nearest processing center for a special treat.

All post-pregnant, post menopausal, malcontents, and lesbians: tsk tsk.. tsk tsk tsk tsk tsk. No cookie for you.

[Federal Guy-dlines]

A stitch in time saves nine.

[dagny]

The March of Dimes recently gave a bunch of vitamins with folic acid to planned parenthood to give to any "women of childbearing age."

Which was kinda funny to me, since although they do serve that demographic, you generally go there to avoid that whole pregnancy thing...

But hey, free vitamins.