As Rachel Maddow noted in her segment above, it looks like Indiana Gov. Mike Pence may be set to follow in Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell's shoes and take over the title of Governor Ultrasound if he ends up supporting this bill that just passed his state's Senate.
February 21, 2013

As Rachel Maddow noted in her segment above, it looks like Indiana Gov. Mike Pence may be set to follow in Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell's shoes and take over the title of Governor Ultrasound if he ends up supporting this bill that just passed his state's Senate.

Indiana Bill Would Force Women To Undergo Two Transvaginal Probes To Take A Pill (UPDATED):

A medication abortion pill, officially known as RU-486, is the earliest available abortion option for a woman. A patient could be as little as one week pregnant and take the pill to terminate. But despite the incredibly early stage at which the pill is administered, a new bill proposed in the Indiana State Senate would require women to undergo a transvaginal ultrasound before they are permitted to simply swallow the medication.

Indiana’s effort follows a sweeping national trend to mandate the medically unnecessary and invasive procedure as a way to create barriers to abortion access. And theirs goes a step further, by also forcing clinics that administer the pill to meet all of the same requirements as a surgical abortion clinic: [...]

UPDATE: Indiana’s bill is actually twice as invasive as most forced ultrasound bills, the Huffington Post reports. The version that advanced out of a Senate committee today would require women to undergo two transvaginal probes — before and after taking the abortion pill. There’s no medically necessary reason to require an ultrasound after an abortion procedure, since women can simply take a blood test to see whether their hormone levels have returned to normal to verify that they are no longer pregnant.

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