U.S. Senate to Vote Saturday Night
By WeNEWS Staff
(WOMENSENEWS)--
- The Senate is scheduled to vote on whether to open debate on its healthcare reform bill tomorrow night. This version does not include a federal abortion coverage ban.
Unlike the House, the Senate's bill protects the status quo for reproductive healthcare coverage for women. Not a single Republican is expected to vote for the bill, so the Senate will need all 58 Democrats and the two Independents to reach the minimal number of votes to overcome Republican.
- Not before age 21. That is the startling new guideline for when women should begin having annual tests to check for a common and preventable form of cancer. The leading U.S. group of women's health care professionals issued the new guidelines Friday and also recommended less frequent subsequent tests for cervical cancer, Agence France-Press and other news agencies reported. Pushing back the age of the first screening would help deter giving teen girls unnecessary treatments, which can have "economic, emotional and future childbearing implications," according to the guidelines issued by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. The physicians' organization previously recommended that cervical cancer screening begin three years after first sexual intercourse or by age 21, whichever occurred first. But the guidelines were revised because "screening for cervical cancer in adolescents only serves to increase their anxiety and has led to overuse of follow-up procedures for something that usually resolves on its own," said Alan Waxman, who led the organization's team that drew up the recommendations.
- Companies with women in top positions perform better and are more socially responsible, but there are few women in California corporate executive suites and board rooms, according to a graduate school study, Los Angeles Business reported Nov. 19. Women hold only 10.6 percent of the top management and board positions in California's largest 400 firms, down from 10.9 percent in 2008. Forty-six percent of the companies have no female executives.
- Pregnant women with multiple sclerosis, or MS, may have a higher risk of certain pregnancy complications, but overall their pregnancies are as healthy as women without the nerve disorder, according to a study, Reuters reported Nov. 18. "When you combine our findings of relatively good pregnancy outcomes in women with MS with the large body of evidence that the underlying disease seems to improve during pregnancy," Dr. Eliza F. Chakravarty said in the article. "It strongly suggests that women should not necessarily be discouraged from becoming pregnant just because they have MS."
- Veracruz, Mexico, became the country's 17th state to declare that life begins at conception, The Associated Press reported Nov. 18. The state's government also asked the nation's Congress to consider outlawing abortion, which is likely to make abortion a federal issue in Mexico.
- Verizon Wireless's HopeLine program donated $40,000 to eight organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area that focus on Asian American women affected by domestic violence, PRNewswire reported Nov. 18.
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