RU-486 key to breaking women's chains

Finally.

The FDA has given its approval for the RU-486 abortion pill to be made available to a woman who wants to terminate her pregnancy.

In 1997, women will no longer have to be harassed by protesters who believe it is their right to prevent them from seeking solace at a Planned Parenthood clinic. When a woman needs support, she goes to a clinic, only to be confronted by an angry mob of anti-abortionists.

People certainly have the right to demonstrate for a cause they believe in but these protesters go beyond marching and holding picket signs.

For example, in 1995, the Plainsmen, a militia group in Lincoln, Neb., displayed a hangman's noose outside of a Planned Parenthood clinic. In Kansas City, Mo., clinics had to hire security because of shootings and vandalism by anti-abortion protesters. On March 27, 1996, Jennifer Patterson Speale and Clark Ryan Martin were convicted on conspiracy charges to commit arson.

Making the pill available by prescription also protects physicians and nurses working in abortion clinics who are constantly under attack by anti-choice fanatics. There have been numerous attempted murders and deaths connected with the pro-lifers.

On Sept. 9, 1995, Shelley Shannon was sentenced to 20 years in prison for setting fires at several Oregon clinics. Paul Hill was convicted of killing a doctor and his security guard in Pensacola, Fla. John C. Salvi III was accused of shooting attacks at three clinics in Massachusetts.

In addition to the protection women and their doctors will gain, doctor and patient can maintain a higher level of privacy.

The pill will be available by prescription from the patient's doctor and can be administered right in the office.

Being able to take this pill also makes it easier for a woman to terminate her pregnancy due to medical or health problems who have to do so.

Because the pill can be taken as soon as a woman finds out she is pregnant, it eliminates the risks that can occur during the surgical procedure. Women in the U.S. now do not have to deal with all the trauma that goes along with an already devastating situation. Women no longer have to be shuffled in through the back doors of hospitals and clinics. Physicians will no longer have to be escorted by body guards just to go back and forth to work. In other countries such as France, women have had access to the RU-486 for years. Because of the moral platitudes thrust upon us by our Judeo-Christian institutions, women have been made to suffer because of their choices. Soon women can handle their personal affairs in private.

It's about time.