Oklahoma Just Tripled the Waiting Period for Abortions
In her continued effort to make life as hard as possible for the women of Oklahoma, Governor Mary Fallin signed a new law last night that triples the state’s abortion waiting period, from 24 to 72 hours. Arkansas also recently extended its waiting period, and Florida and Tennessee are considering bills to do the same.
Fallin signed the bill on Wednesday; it goes into effect November 1. According to NewsOK, she said it was enacted with the ladies in mind, totally, of course: “This legislation will help women get the information they need before making a decision they can’t take back. It will allow for more time to consider medical risks as well as explore alternatives to abortion, such as adoption.”
Waiting periods don’t actually do that, of course, and the real intent seems to just be to create another hurdle. They do that quite well: a 2009 study by the Guttmacher Institute found that the main impact of waiting periods was to increase the number of women going out of state for abortions and the number of women seeking second trimester abortions. Last month, Oklahoma also banned a common second trimester abortion procedure. The two laws together create a really impressive no-win situation that, like most abortion restrictions, will largely impact poor women.
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