In 1987, President Reagan asked the Surgeon General to report on the medical and psychological impact of abortion on women. The report was expected by some Presidential advisors to have negative implications for Roe versus Wade, since that Supreme Court decision was based in part on the medical benefits of abortion compared to carrying an unwanted pregnancy to term. HHS set aside $200,000 from other projects for the abortion report, and the Surgeon General and his staff spent more than a year and a half compiling information and meeting with experts representing a wide range of views on abortion. The report was completed in January of this year, but never released; instead, a letter from Dr. Koop to President Reagan was released to the press by the administration. The text of the draft report follows. This is all from the Congressional Record, March 21, 1989. It is cut and pasted from the Thomas (http://thomas.loc.gov) site. The actual report seems to be inmposible to be found. It is alluded to often and sited, but as it was never released and looks to have been buried by out rightous leaders as it did not fit their agenda.
I wanted to point out a few key recommendations of the report/draft…

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The public issue of abortion is not primarily a debate about health but is about morality and law. But because the personal issue of abortion is about an unintended pregnancy and an unwanted fetus, even a nationwide accord concerning the moral aspects of this issue would not prevent an unplanned pregnancy.

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Women who have unintended pregnancies need practicable alternatives to abortion. Three major alternatives that would eliminate or decrease the number of abortions performed in the United States are to bear and raise the child, to place the child for adoption, and to prevent unintended pregnancy in the first place. Seems like we are getting option two shoved down our throats??

To give birth and raise a child demands a long-term commitment to placing someone else’s welfare above one’s own. To give birth and to place a child for adoption is an unselfish act that requires great emotional strength and courage. In this self-sacrificing respect for the life and welfare of the child, the birth parents may be able to give a beautiful gift to a couple who want a child but cannot have their own. Well, it seems the governments position on this was skewed from the get go!

As a nation, we must be willing to help those women who wish to see their unintended pregnancy to term. The woman who chooses to have an unintended baby rather than an abortion will take on a great social and financial burden. If our society wants fewer abortions, it must be willing to support not only those children who are so born but also the women who make that choice. As a society, we must make a commitment to provide loving families for all children placed for adoption. When women decide to bear their own child, rather than stigmatize them, we must sustain them by ensuring subsidized prenatal and delivery costs, foster care, day care benefits for the working mother, and educational and job guarantees during maternity leave.
The sexual partners of such women should be held jointly responsible for the mother and child’s medical care and for child support. Otherwise, society must carry the financial liability.

As long as there are unwanted and unaccepted pregnancies, some women will find a way to have an abortion. Since there is consensus that abortion is a tragedy and represents the failure of individuals, of some part of our society, or of both, it would seem that here, as in other health issues subject to personal control, we must deliver prevention messages to the population at risk. The vast majority of the groups that consulted with me agreed that prevention of an unintended pregnancy is the best approach for reducing the need for abortion.

America must invest in a long-term program that aggressively markets prevention to the various populations at risk for unintended pregnancy. We must:

Recommend successful family life programs that teach postponement of sexual involvement and responsible decision making. We cannot rely on programs that limit sex education to biology and birth control;And then WhY are we teaching absinance only programs that are known to fail?? Why are we cutting birth control from medicade??

Structure family life course so that parents, civic groups and church groups can participate and reinforce behaviors based on communal values and on respect and love for oneself and others; And how does adoption fit into this??? For it sure is not a “love oneself” type of gesture? It’s more like a slow assisted suicide.

Educate the public about methods to prevent unwanted pregnancies. Such education must be honest in its appraisal of the methods and must dispel myths, so that an informed decision can be made;Oh but wait, then we must deny them the abiilty to get said methods, or allow hypocratic people to judge and define when and where we should have access to said methods.

Initiate programs that attempt to modify the behavior of those sexually active men and women who do not always use contraceptives or who practice ineffective contraception; Ummm would that be adoption?? Bad bad people now you did not use contraceptives and we will take away these non planned children of yours!!

Teach men that they are as responsible as their sexual partners for preventing unwanted pregnancies; Gee, does the punitive fathers registry really do that??

Support behavioral research to identify and modify the risk factors of those women most likely to have unintended pregnancies;

Promote a national commitment to contraceptive research for both men and women. The objective should be a method that is 100% effective, has minimal side effects, and is safe and easy to use. ha ha ha ..omg are you laughing now??

Encourage family physicians to actively convey information and to teach sexuality in reference to family planning, as they have for AIDS;

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Insofar as the public health resources of this country can make a difference, I conclude that the following must be done:

Men and women should be helped and encouraged, as a matter of national public health policy, to conceive children only when they are ready and able to welcome and care for them;

When children are conceived unintentionally, we must remove the stigma from this very human event;

We must support those parents who bear their children and either keep them or place them for adoption, just as our laws support those who resort to abortion as the only feasible personal alternative.

To realize these goals, we as a Nation must provide better choices. How can we be less resourceful in supporting parents who decide to bear their children than we are in protecting other parents’ freedom not to bear unwanted children?

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Now one might read into this and say..hmm good ideas. But lets look at the big picture here. This draft is now 17 years old..so what has the government done lately??
Federally funded maternity homes.
Federally funded embreyo adoptions
Cut tons of programs to welfare, dependant care, day care, education, work force, no national helath care, college grants, medicade, aid to women and children..as opposed to:we must sustain them by ensuring subsidized prenatal and delivery costs, foster care, day care benefits for the working mother, and educational and job guarantees during maternity leave .
Allowed self rightous phamacsits and doctors deny family planning needs based on their own judgement.
Make every abortion provider speak about adoption as an ‘loving choice’.
Federally fund “infant adoption awarness training”
and allow South Dakota and many other states have agressive anti choice legislation on their books with nary a glance.
oh and the list goes on…..

I betcha one of the Bush twins has had an abortion. Betcha a 100 bucks! Story has it that Good old GW was involved as a party to a woman who has recieved an abortion.

Think about it..they did the research, they found the findings,they had a plan and recoomendations for what would work, they didn’t like them, so they buried it and now have their own unresearched, based on whatever agenda long range plan way in motion.
But, you know, they can blame now it all on those “evil doers” becasue if it wasn’t for the damn war and it’s 1 billion dollars a day needed to safe guard our freedom (ha!!)and kill our troops, then we might have some of the cash needed for these great public endevors. But Snowflake embroyo adoptions is deemed worthy?
WTF is up with that??