The Catholic Conference of Virginia is sounding the alarm over a new zoning amendment being considered by the Alexandria City Council that could make it easier to build abortion clinics by designating them as a “care-related” entity. health”.
The group, which represents the Diocese of Arlington and Richmond, Va., said this week that the proposed new amendment would give abortion clinics “special status” in areas set aside for commercial and mixed-use properties by listing explicitly abortion clinics as health offices and physicians. care establishments.
“The amendment would allow clinics that provide ‘abortion services’ to locate in these ‘lawful’ areas, i.e. regardless of potential impacts on the region and regardless of needs of Alexandria into primary care physicians and other vital health clinics,” the group said.
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Demonstrators protest against abortion outside the Supreme Court in Washington, DC on June 24, 2022. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
The Alexandria City Council is scheduled to meet on April 15 to consider the amendment. The Catholic Conference of Virginia is urging local citizens to contact the city council to “oppose this policy statement to prioritize abortion, regardless of the impact on the area.”
“Abortion clinics should not be prioritized over other facilities that meet the current definition of a health profession office,” the group said in a statement it recommends using to convince members council to oppose the measure.
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“Unlike the services provided by primary care physicians, gastroenterologists, and otolaryngologists, all of whom perform outpatient surgeries, abortion is not a preventative or lifesaving health care service. It puts ending lives rather than healing them or saving them,” it said.
Protesters outside the Washington, D.C. Supreme Court protest the abortion ruling overturning Roe v. Wade. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)
“Rather than making unnecessary policy changes to the zoning code, the City should focus on working with the health care community to serve those who need primary care and preventative services and therefore contribute to well-being. General of the City and its residents,” the group said, adding that the city should instead focus on mother-and-child-friendly efforts.
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Currently in Virginia, abortion is legal until the second trimester – about 26 weeks into the pregnancy. A full-term pregnancy is considered to be around 40 weeks.
Anti-abortion activists celebrate outside the Supreme Court in Washington, DC on June 24, 2022. (OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images)
Following Dobbs v. Whole Women’s Health The Supreme Court’s decision last summer, which overturned the 50-year-old federal precedent of Roe v. Wade and referred the issue of abortion rights to the states, Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin lobbied to allow abortion during the first 15 weeks of pregnancy, and ban it thereafter. But those efforts were met with opposition from the state legislature.
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According to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, a fetus may experience pain at 26 weeks. Around this time, experts say, a fetus has fully formed eyes, can hear and respond to sound, and can be shown in an ultrasound sucking its thumb.
The clerk of the Alexandria City Council did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.