Sensible Erection | You're pregnant 2 weeks before you're pregnant

Sunday, 26 August 2012

You're pregnant 2 weeks before you're pregnant

quote [ In Arizona, women are now legally pregnant two weeks before conception, according to a new law, the Orwellianly-named, “Women’s Health and Safety Act,” signed yesterday by Republican Governor Jan Brewer ]

What the actual fuck?

I know this is reasonably old news, but I hadn't seen it before and I couldn't find anything about it in the search.

[politics] [by Viper@11:25amGMT] [+10 WTF]

Comments

incpenners said @ 12:06pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:1 Funny]
Not to worry.

Some people think that Obamacare invalidates Roe v. Wade.

Reminds me of a joke I heard yesterday:
Hurricane Isaac has the Tampa convention in its sights. Republicans can't decide what's the fastest way out of town., Row versus wade.

(attributed to John Stewart)

Naruki said @ 1:16pm GMT on 26th Aug
Also told as "George Bush only has one concern about how the poor people should get themselves out of New Orleans: ~"

eIfish said @ 10:38pm GMT on 26th Aug
So it's pronounced 'versus' in America? In the UK it's pronounced 'and'.

quaint said @ 12:22am GMT on 27th Aug
It is?

I would pronounce it "v".

eIfish said @ 11:50am GMT on 27th Aug
Only when discussing law. Not in general usage or anything.

sanepride said @ 5:59pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:1 Funny]
Some people are drawing conclusions based on completely false assumptions about the reach of Obamacare.

And also I see that former GOP FL Governor Charlie Crist has endorsed Obama.

incpenners said @ 6:44pm GMT on 26th Aug
If you think Charlie Crist helps your guy, please, take him.

sanepride said @ 6:53pm GMT on 26th Aug
Actually nobody helps 'our guy' more than Mitt Romney.
The GOP platform doesn't hurt either, especially the part that calls for the banning of all abortions without exception (AKA 'the Akin Amendment').

willrogers said @ 9:57pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:2]
Townhall.com?

Jesus, you're as obtuse as the author.

The justices could inadvertently overturn Roe v. Wade by making statements that conflict with it.

No, they couldn't. Lower courts might interpret some language to mean that, but Roe v. Wade wouldn't be overturned unless SCOTUS actually did something about, e.g. agreed with a lower court's interpretation that the language overturned Roe v. Wade or simply refused to hear such a case. SCOTUS could just as easily review the case and such an interpretation is total bullshit and not actually accurate.

There is a certain absurdity to the Roe v. Wade ruling. The ruling is based on a philosophy of limited government that is closer to the normal views of those called "conservatives" than to the views of those called "liberals". However, the conservatives have traditionally opposed the decision and the liberals have supported it.

The right to privacy has always been supported by liberals but is frequently opposed by conservatives, and in no way is the right to privacy somehow contradictory or hypocritical for a liberal to support. Conservatives are the ones who are hypocritical to use the term "limited government" to describe their political philosophy, as they are constantly in favor of government being given powers to tyrannically control people lives, ranging from drug prohibition to contraceptive availability restrictions to pornography censorship to sex shop zoning restrictions to anti-sodomy laws, etc.

The two groups also reverse their normal positions on regulation of abortion providers. Conservatives, who normally try to limit government regulations, favor strict regulation of abortion providers. Liberals, who normally favor strict regulation of health care providers, believe women who seek abortions don't deserve the same protective regulations of health care providers that protect those who visit facilities that treat both men and women.

Bullshit, conservatives don't give a fuck about the health of these women, their only interest in regulating abortion providers is to make the restrictions as onerous that it would be impossible to legally perform abortions and comply with those regulations, e.g. recent state level regulations on the sizes and dimensions of medical offices which perform abortions so that current establishments wouldn't be able to continue performing abortions until they performed costly construction modifications.

It's a completely false strawman that liberals, who normally favor strict regulation of health care providers, believe women who seek abortions don't deserve the same protective regulations of health care providers that protect those who visit facilities that treat both men and women. There is absolutely no difference in the regulations on doctors performing abortions as there are in doctors who don't (e.g. same regulations as far as credentialing, licensing, conforming to DEA prescribing regulations, universal precautions, etc.) and "liberals" are not advocating otherwise. It's completely false to assert that liberals are somehow callous and blase about women's health because they don't favor these new regulations by anti-choice extremists, as these regulations don't actually improve safety or women's health. For example, the FDA has already performed research and enacted evidence-based regulations on the abortifacient pills mentioned in the OP and the new regulations enacted by anti-choice extremists don't improve the safety of these pills but rather just make it more difficult to get access to them and use them legally.

The philosophy of Roe v. Wade is that health care decisions like abortion are a private matter and government has only limited authority to intervene in private health care decisions. Obamacare is based on a philosophy that there is no right to privacy in health care. Government can control what health care people can obtain by forcing them to purchase insurance that may not cover the type of health care they want or need.

More bullshit. Obamacare does absolutely nothing to the right of privacy because it doesn't restrict any aspect of your private life, just like having auto insurance if you're going to drive a car is not restricting your right to privacy. You are simply required to have some kind of coverage if you don't meet any of the exempting conditions like having a yearly income under a certain amount for your household size. Obamacare doesn't restrict what healthcare people can get, nor does it cause people to get lower quality healthcare, the exact opposite is true. It enacts regulations which raise the minimum level of care an insurance company is required to provide to higher standards, e.g. no restrictions on preexisting conditions, no lifetime benefit maximums, and no copays or deductibles for things like contraceptives. This means that no matter what healthcare you choose to purchase, your choices will all meet a certain minimum level to protect you from being exploited by your insurer, but you also have the option of purchasing plans that are significantly better than the minimum requirements, such as those with lower deductibles and copays.

For example, consider the case of a young transsexual who wants to save money he budgets for health care until he has enough money to pay for surgery to transform him into a woman. He might be unable to save his money for the operation if he had to first pay for insurance that would not cover the cost of the operation. Or, consider the case of a young woman who wants to fix what she considers flaws in her appearance, including paying for breast enhancement. Insurance companies wouldn't cover such procedures.

First of all, if this transperson makes below a certain amount of money per year for their given household size, they are not required to buy health insurance on their own, but if they do want to, the government will assist them in purchasing some if they are not eligible for Medicaid. Secondly, gender reassignment surgery is not at all the same thing as cosmetic breast enhancement, and to suggest such is incredibly offensive to transgender people. Thirdly, there isn't an inherent problem/conflict here, because this transperson could simply purchase (likely with the government's help) an insurance policy which actually covers many, if not all, gender reassignment medical costs. Fourthly, your example isn't actually arguing against Obamacare, regulation, or Roe v. Wade, it's actually an argument that Obamacare doesn't go far enough and that all gender reassignment services (everything from hormone replacement therapy to actual reassignment surgery) should be part of the minimum regulations for all insurance plans.

Congress can require people to purchase insurance that only covers conventional treatments that don't help them.. If they benefit from "experimental" treatments instead they must first pay for the type treatment that doesn't help them before they pay for the treatment that works.

That's not how health insurance works. In reality, insurance works by customers paying their monthly premiums to receive coverage whether they actually receive medical care or not. When someone wants to receive care, they must then (depending on what the care is) pay for care until they meet their deductible level and then pay any coinsurance, if any, left up to a maximum out-of-pocket expense. If a person's plan does not cover a given treatment, especially experimental treatments, then they aren't being forced to pay for the conventional treatment for the same condition covered by their insurance plan, they just have to pay whatever the experimental one costs, they do not have to pay for or take part in the conventional one. At most, this person will just have to pay their monthly premium, which is not at all the same thing as paying for the conventional treatment they don't want and don't believe will help them.

More importantly, there is good reason that only conventional treatments are generally covered (though customers can actually appeal to their insurer to cover experimental treatments depending on the individual case and the medical evidence behind the experimental treatment), it's meant to keep quack pseudoscience out of medicine. Without that restriction, all kinds of scheisters and quacks would try to get their unproven and potentially dangerous treatments covered by insurance companies to line their own pockets. In some cases, there are experimental treatments that might help, but the issue still that they haven't been sufficiently tested for efficacy and safety. It's sad that this creates a limbo state for patients who want to use the treatment while it is in the approval process, but the process is important to assure that they are receiving safe and effective care rather than letting their desperation being taken advantage of.

Under Obamacare, wealthy members of Congress decide whether or not individuals can afford health insurance regardless of the needs and priorities of specific individuals. Under Obamacare there is no right to privacy in determining spending priorities. Government dictates what they must spend on the health care the government decides they can have.

Wrong again. As already mentioned, there are plenty of exceptions in the law to meet the individual needs of citizens, including income, employment, family size, medical history, age, etc. There is no violation of the right to privacy here, as the law is not forcing you to spend money on any medical procedures at all, but rather that you must have some kind of coverage, which meets the minimum standards for insurers set up by the government (e.g. the exchanges), as long as you don't meet one of its exceptions. If you don't want a conventional treatment, you don't have to spend money on it. The government isn't dictating what you need to spend on healthcare or what healthcare you can get, it's just setting minimum standards or benchmarks so that you don't get screwed over by your insurance company. Beyond that, you can spend as much or as little on healthcare as you want and can purchase more extensive insurance policies if you so choose, e.g. a policy that covers gender reassignment.

Contrast this with actual violations of your right-to-privacy, like the government telling you what contraceptives you can take (a la Rick Santorum) or whether homosexuality is legal (a la Santorum and Ron Paul). Obamacare is not the government telling you can't have gender reassignment or that you can't have any "unconventional" medical procedures (though the FDA and FTC frequently do test and evaluate these things anyways and determine their safety, e.g. snake oils advertised in informercials or toxic/adulturated treatments from abroad) or that you have to pay for a given procedure. Shit, the government doesn't even require that you get vaccines unless you want to be admitted to a public establishment or facility like a public school.

That entire article relies on lies, half-truths, taking things out of context and various other forms of dishonesty common on Townhall.com and various other idiotic conservative websites.

sanepride said @ 11:51pm GMT on 26th Aug
You don't expect penners to actually read this, do you?

willrogers said @ 12:49am GMT on 27th Aug
I expect a +1 funny from him. That is all.

sanepride said @ 1:08am GMT on 27th Aug
Hell I could get one of those from him with only a 1/10th of the effort and wordage.

willrogers said @ 11:20pm GMT on 27th Aug
I said that I expected a +1 Funny from him, not that it was the reason why I wrote all that.

RhesusMonkey said @ 12:08am GMT on 27th Aug
+1 "I should have just read this before posting"

RhesusMonkey said @ 12:05am GMT on 27th Aug
So... their argument is that "well if they were paying for insurance they can't save for that surgery they always wanted!" - am I alone in thinking that they are ineligible to have a surgery, of any kind, without insurance?

Also I don't believe the ACA "forces" anyone to buy insurance, it simply "forces" insurance companies to make it available without discrimination at affordable prices, no? If people were "forced" to pay for insurance it would be a form of single-payer, which was rejected, yes?

I is confused.

willrogers said @ 12:59am GMT on 27th Aug
No, the individual mandate is exactly what it sounds like, you have to have insurance of some kind (the PPACA mandates the minimum level of coverage insurers must provide) unless you meet one of the exemptions. If you're not exempt but still have trouble affording insurance the government will help.

The individual mandate is not single payer. Single payer is also what it sounds like, there is one single payer for all medical expenses for every citizen, i.e. the government. Canada and the UK both have single payer systems but each is a bit different. Canada's government pays for medical expenses but healthcare providers (e.g. hospitals, physicians, mental health professionals, etc.) are mostly privately employed, thoguh, just like in the US, some do work for the government. In the UK's NHS, the government pays for healthcare expenses and almost all doctors, nurses, etc. in hospitals and clinics are actually government employees. I think there are still some privately employed doctors, nurses, etc., but I'm not sure what percentage of the overall medical population these people are. Also, both Canada and the UK have some forms of private insurance with which people can supplement their single payer coverage, but it's mostly rich people who do, though I think travelers health insurance is also popular for Canadians and Britons who travel abroad.

Single payer is just one of many forms of universal healthcare, the others include systems like Germany's where employers must provide all employees health insurance and the unemployed, disabled, etc. are covered by the government. More recently, to help decrease its unemployment rate, the German government offered to temporarily defray part or all of the healthcare costs for employers to decrease the overall costs of hiring workers.

SnappyNipples said @ 12:16pm GMT on 26th Aug
Holy Shit, Arizona just keeps making my state look better everyday. Then again I live in El Paso, the bastard city of Texas where the teaparty just passed us by. We do not expect Mittens to visit up but I'm sure Obama will drop in.

ENZ said @ 12:48pm GMT on 26th Aug
Well, at least it's an actual woman behind all this, for a change.

kdog2112 said @ 1:04pm GMT on 26th Aug
Can a woman thats "going to be pregnant" in two weeks, breastfeed in public?

Naruki said @ 1:17pm GMT on 26th Aug
What would she breastfeed?

kdog2112 said @ 1:24pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:3]
Her boyfriend. It could also be considered foreplay before conception.

I'm trying to make as much sense as the law.

Naruki said @ 2:26am GMT on 27th Aug
Well you're failing, because I understand you perfectly.

Viking_Biochemist said @ 1:14pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:5 Informative]
As someone pointed out in the comments, this is the normal way of calculating gestational age. You measure from the end of the last menstrual period, which is about two weeks before conception in most cases.

A full term 40 week pregnancy is actually 38 weeks from conception.
A standard 20 week foetal abnormality scan is actually 18 weeks post conception.
Every midwife, obgyn and pregnancy resource I've dealt with uses this dating method.

underdog said @ 2:13pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:5 Funny]
Any dating method that results in the chance of conception is ok by me.

lalanda said @ 3:02pm GMT on 26th Aug
Uh...why?

And do all states do that already?

Moleculor said @ 6:02pm GMT on 26th Aug
I'm not a doctor (but I did sleep in a Holiday Inn Express last night):

The body probably has gestational changes based on hormonal cycles, and these cycles don't stop for pregnancy? Maybe? So in terms of how "ready" a baby is to come out, it may actually matter less how long the embryo/fetus has existed, and matter more how long it's been since your last menstruation.

(Blind guess here, no actual research or evidence. This is otherwise known as "bullshitting". But who knows, I might be right?)

eIfish said @ 8:37pm GMT on 26th Aug
AIUI, a full-term birth is induced by the baby, not the mother. The placenta (which develops from the blastocyst) secretes hormones into the bloodstreams, which trigger the baby to prepare for being born, and the mother to birth it.

Viking_Biochemist said @ 2:46am GMT on 27th Aug
Not really. Pregnancy messes everything around pretty hard. The foetus determines when it's due and initiates labour.

foobar said @ 6:35pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:1 Insightful]
I'm guessing because that's the only thing they can slap a definite date on.

puravida said @ 7:49pm GMT on 26th Aug
Bingo.

I mean really, what else can you use? Unless you were taking daily blood samples of human chorionic gonadotropin or something invasive like that, there's no other real way to tell =/

Viking_Biochemist said @ 2:44am GMT on 27th Aug
You can measure the growth rate of the emrbyo on an ultrasound, at least early on.

puravida said @ 11:04pm GMT on 27th Aug
True. I mean the only way to tell definitively.

Basing age on size alone can be tricky, since fetuses can be "small for gestational age" or have "intrauterine growth restriction", throwing the whole thing off. But yeah, you are also correct =)

yogi said @ 7:46pm GMT on 26th Aug
It's a joke. Any dating--a date with a woman--that results in the chance of conception--sex--is OK.

Good pun.

backSLIDER said @ 8:19pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:2 Funny]
Wait... can you elaborate?

Viking_Biochemist said @ 2:40am GMT on 27th Aug
It's the only certain date you've got. Even if you can identify exactly when you had sex, conception usually doesn't happen for another couple of days.

They use the same dating system (conception 2 weeks after "start of pregnancy" based on last menstrual period) even if you more accurately identify the foetal age some other way.

I wound up having two ultrasounds two days apart about 6 weeks in, and based on the growth of the embryo they could narrow age down to within a day or two. That gave an age that was over a week out from the LMP calculation, but they still used the add-two-weeks-to-the-age dating method, just shifted a bit.

eIfish said @ 8:38pm GMT on 26th Aug
So is this also a normal way of calculating term limits on abortion?

Or a sneaky way of shaving off a fortnight through the back door?

mrklipp said @ 9:02pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:1 Underrated]
I'm pretty sure that if the back door was involved, an abortion wouldn't have been needed.

Viking_Biochemist said @ 2:32am GMT on 27th Aug
I don't know specifically about abortion, but it's the normal way of calculating foetal age. If someone says "22 weeks is the limit of viability", they mean 22 weeks from last menstrual period.

Hugh E. said @ 2:10pm GMT on 26th Aug [Score:2 Underrated]
New Rule: articles that criticize a law must link to/quote the text of the law.

yogi said @ 7:43pm GMT on 26th Aug
So if I can't conceive that a sperm of mine will get a lady preggers, am I guilty?

backSLIDER said @ 8:22pm GMT on 26th Aug
Better yet, if I shoot blanks is that the same as shooting a child? (Using pro lifer logic)

yogi said @ 11:53pm GMT on 26th Aug
That's a goodie, too.

sanepride said @ 8:46pm GMT on 26th Aug
Old news btw. This actually happened last April.

sanepride said @ 8:53pm GMT on 26th Aug
Also, the law has been blocked by a federal Appeals Court.

Viper said @ 11:49pm GMT on 27th Aug
Yes, as stated in the extended

jhvh1 said @ 12:52am GMT on 27th Aug [Score:-1 Overrated]
Does this have anything to do with the OB/GYN counting two weeks prior to my girlfriend actually getting pregnant and saying that is the date she got pregnant? Cause we are still confused about that.

sanepride said @ 1:09am GMT on 27th Aug
Yes. See Viking's comment above.

Viking_Biochemist said @ 2:44am GMT on 27th Aug
Yes.

A just-this-minute-concieved embryo has a gestational age of two weeks.
A 40 week pregnancy is 38 weeks post-conception.

I'm not sure why they don't just say "pregnancy starts two weeks after the last menstrual period", but I'm not an expert on these matters.

jhvh1 said @ 3:08am GMT on 27th Aug [Score:-1 Overrated]
I am unclear why they say it starts two weeks after the last menstrual cycle. This is our first so it is all new to me and her but we are confused as hell as to how/why they are coming up with the due dates that they keep changing anyhow...

Meh, some time next year, I have to grow up and be a dad, I will leave it at that.

Viking_Biochemist said @ 2:46am GMT on 27th Aug
Sensationalist article is sensationalist.

sanepride said @ 2:59am GMT on 27th Aug
And old. Don't forget old.

Dr. Zoidberg said @ 4:16am GMT on 27th Aug
And juicy. Very, very juicy!