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The latest on the Key Bridge collapse, New York puts forth legislation to get clean energy projects on the grid and Wisconsin and other states join a federal summer food program to help feed kids across the country.

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Republicans float conspiracy theories on the collapse of Baltimore's Key Bridge, South Carolina's congressional elections will use a map ruled unconstitutional, and the Senate schedules an impeachment trial for Homeland Secretary Mayorkas.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

NC Abortion Debate Looms: Public Asked to Comment on DHHS Rules

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Thursday, December 11, 2014   

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – The future of reproductive health in North Carolina is in the hands of the general public.

This month, the North Carolina Department of Health (DHHS) and Human Services proposed new regulations for abortion clinics and now the public has an opportunity to comment.

If 10 or more people object to the rules, the General Assembly will have to make the final determination.

Dr. David Grimes, a professor in the department of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of North Carolina, fears a possible abortion debate at the state level could be counterproductive to women's health.

"We need to hope that this does not become a political football now in the General Assembly, where politicians with no medical background try to tinker with the very fine product that's been developed," he stresses.

Grimes says the rules proposed by DHHS are reasonable guidelines to ensure that women who want to terminate a pregnancy can do so as safely as possible.

The rules require more post-operative care, a 24-hour number to call if complications arise and a defibrillator on-site in case of cardiac arrest.

The state was required to draft new rules by a bill signed into law last year.

As a result, several clinics that had provided abortion services closed, saying they were unable to meet the new law's requirement that abortion clinics meet some of the same standards as outpatient surgery centers.

Grimes says the current policy is prompting some women to make tough decisions.

"It's getting more and more difficult, and it's important to know that if women don't have access to safe, legal abortion, they'll do what they did before Roe v. Wade,” he points out. “They'll do dangerous self-abortion attempts, or resort to the back alley."

Supporters of the changes say they were necessary for the state to update its 20-year-old regulations regarding abortion.





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