Arizona history was made this week.
Over 800,000 Arizona voters have made their voices heard. We want the chance to support the Arizona Abortion Access Act. And we proved it by turning in the most voter signatures ever collected through a citizen initiative in our state’s history.
More than 7,000 volunteers and Arizona’s thousands of canvassers collected signatures from voters in all 15 counties, from independents, Democrats and Republicans, from ages 18 to 100, men and women, and from urban and rural communities.
Everywhere we went, voters were shouting signs in support of restoring and protecting the right to abortion by enshrining this fundamental freedom in our state constitution.
Voters know that without it, extremist politicians and special interests will never stop playing with our lives.
Lawmakers won’t stop restricting abortion access
Over the past decade, anti-abortion extremists in Arizona have passed more than 30 laws restricting women’s access to reproductive health care and mandating exam-office policies that have no medical basis.
Last year, anti-abortion extremists argued to the Arizona Supreme Court that it should reinstate a blanket ban on abortion enacted in 1864, a time when Arizona had not yet achieved statehood, slavery was legal and American women could not vote.
In April of this year, the Arizona Supreme Court shocked the nation by upholding the brutal blanket ban, after which the state legislature narrowly managed to repeal it after weeks of infighting.
That’s why we know they will never stop trying to restrict access to reproductive health care and abortion unless the Arizona Abortion Access Act is passed.
The 823,685 signatures send a clear message: Arizonans don’t want politicians and judges to interfere with our private and personal health care decisions. These signatures send a message that Arizonans recognize that abortion is medical care and that current state law robs all of us of our bodily autonomy and personal freedoms.
Additionally, the constant political activism and policy back and forth has harmed patients, restricted providers and had a chilling effect on reproductive health care across Arizona.
Doctors cut back on care, leave Arizona
Under current unscientific and extreme anti-abortion laws, doctors are forced to deny appropriate medical care to patients who are victims of rape, incest, and human trafficking.
Current law does not allow for basic care to be provided to patients experiencing pregnancy complications or health emergencies.
By making it unclear what health care providers can legally do, current law puts women who are desperate to become pregnant in unnecessarily dangerous situations.
Republicans miscalculated on abortion:And voters were not amused.
Doctors are tired of worrying that they could be punished with jail time, fines or even loss of licenses for providing basic evidence-based medicine.
My colleagues and I know physicians who have closed parts of their practices or left the state rather than provide substandard care, and new physicians are choosing not to practice here because Arizona has a reputation for denying the realities of medicine.
Anti-abortion extremists have been spreading lies for decades. They distort science, deny medical facts, and cite far-fetched scenarios that never happened in order to scare voters. Our opponents are also lying, claiming this bill makes changes that are not written anywhere in the bill.
Reject their threats and send a message
As a practicing obstetrician-gynecologist for 40 years, let me be clear: The Arizona Abortion Access Act would maintain all medical safeguards, certification and licensing requirements, and continue the patient safety standards currently in place.
Anything else is a lie designed to intimidate and manipulate voters.
These are an insult to the nurses, doctors and medical professionals who are educated, licensed and experienced in this field and who overwhelmingly support this measure precisely because they put patient safety and health first.
This November, voters will have the opportunity to send a powerful message that politicians will never again have more control over our health care decisions than we do ourselves.
We are taking back the freedom to decide our own future, and that freedom means not having the government interfere with our personal health care decisions.
Candace Liu, MD, is an obstetrician-gynecologist with nearly 40 years of medical experience practicing worldwide. She is the chair of the Arizona Abortion Access Act Campaign Committee. Please send your comments to chair@arizoanforabortionaccess.org.
