The Pentagon will provide travel funding to military personnel and their families who wish to have an abortion but are in states where the procedure is now illegal, the ministry said Thursday.
The military will also strengthen privacy protection mechanisms for those seeking abortion care.
The order, issued by Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, describes the rights and protections military personnel and their family members will have regardless of where they are stationed.
On June 24, the US Supreme Court overturned the “Roe v. Wade” decision, which for half a century guaranteed the right of women in the US to terminate a pregnancy and allowed any state to make that decision.
Access to abortion became a central issue in the midterm elections. President Joe Biden promised this week that the first bill he will send to Capitol Hill next year will provide abortion protection, if Democrats have enough seats in Congress to pass it.
Biden said he would support a federal fund to reimburse some costs for those who must travel for the medical procedure.
“I support that and I have publicly urged companies to do so,” Biden said. “I have publicly urged them, as President of the United States, to say, ‘This is what you must do’.”
The Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson stripped women of constitutional protections for abortion and left it to states to determine whether the procedure is legal within their borders. In the months that followed, abortion was banned or severely restricted in more than a dozen states.
The new military policy sets guidelines so that local commanders cannot influence whether military personnel have access to care or face a culture in which they or their dependents do not speak for fear of repercussions.
The decision builds on an initial response from the Pentagon in June when, days after the Supreme Court ruling, it emphasized that it would continue to allow sick leave for conscripts who had to leave the state for an abortion, but noted that it was required to review the court decision and subsequent state laws to see if further guidance was needed.
Austin expects to implement the new policy by the end of this calendar year.
The Pentagon, home to the US Department of Defense, is also concerned that the Supreme Court ruling by a conservative majority could affect the recruitment and retention of military personnel, weighing the risk of them being deployed to states. where abortion is illegal.
Many of the Pentagon’s major military bases are in states such as Texas and Florida, where anti-abortion laws are now in effect.
The new guidelines also instruct any military base to publicly display the availability of reproductive health services for servicemen and their families, extend the time a serviceman must report a pregnancy to commanders to 20 weeks, and provide protection. caregivers who terminate a pregnancy.
Under federal law, the Pentagon’s health care system can only allow abortion in cases of rape or incest or when a mother’s life is in danger.
This principle will not change with the new policy. The funds provided are for the sole purpose of financing transportation and do not include payment for abortions not covered by federal law.
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Source: DN
