An Act Concerning Compassionate Care for Victims of Sexual Assault was signed by Governor Rell on May 16th, and goes into effect on Monday, October 1, 2007.
The new law ensures a consistent and compassionate standard of care at all of Connecticut’s hospitals regarding the provision of emergency contraception. Women who survive rape will now have the legal right to be offered and have access to the full dose of emergency contraception on-site at any one of the hospitals in Connecticut that they may turn to for help.
As you may now know, the Connecticut Catholic Conference recently announced that they have changed their position and are now in support of offering and administering emergency contraception to all rape victims at the four Catholic affiliated hospitals. In order to comply with the law, they will no longer subject women to the unnecessary and highly inaccurate ovulation test that was used to deny women access to emergency contraception.
The FDA approved Plan B as a contraceptive. There is simply no medical or scientific evidence that supports the hypothesis that emergency contraception prevents a fertilized egg from implanting in the uterus or that it effects a pre-existing pregnancy.
Catholic Conferences in neighboring states have long supported the provision of emergency contraception to rape victims and did not oppose similar laws. We are glad that the Connecticut Conference has changed their position and followed suit.
While we expect that all hospitals will comply with the new law, we will continue to monitor the access that survivors have to emergency contraception. If you have questions about the law or access to emergency contraception at a hospital in your community, please contact Laura Cordes, CONNSACS Director of Policy & Advocacy at laura@connsacs.org or by phone at 860.282.9881.
Our collective two year effort has resulted in a law that will have a lasting impact on the lives of women and their families.
Thank you again for your hard work, friendship and support.
To view the new law, click here: Public Act 07-24
To view the bill summary, click here: Public Act 07-24 Summary
To see how your State Representative & Senator voted:
SB 1343 House Vote
SB 1343 Senate Vote
