Pro-Life News

Abortions Dropped After Arson, State Rep. plans bill to force taxpayers to buy insurance for abortion clinics

OLYMPIA, Washington -- When an arsonist torched their clinic nearly a year ago, Eastside Women’s Health Clinic owners Nancy Armstrong and Shelly Pacheco vowed not to let fear keep them from providing abortions. But when they reopen the clinic Monday, after a year working out of a double-wide trailer in the parking lot, there will be no more abortions. It wasn’t the arsonist who stopped them, but their insurance company. The state constitution guarantees a woman’s right to reproductive choices, including abortion, and any infringement of that right — whether by arsonist or insurer — violates the constitution, some officials say. “It would be something of an irony if abortion rights were to be taken away not by courts, but by the actions of insurers responding to terrorists,” said State Rep. Brendan Williams, D-Olympia. Williams, a member of the House Financial Institution and Insurance Committee, has plans he hopes to enact this session to prevent other clinics from suffering the same fate. His idea is to have the state underwrite an insurance risk pool that reproductive health clinics could join. Posted by Editor at November 28, 2005 09:42 AM