Maria E. Roberts

The Global Gag Rule was among the worst abominations to come out of the Bush presidency and my joy knows no bounds now that Pres. Obama's executive order has repealed it.  The abomination was not original with him, as President's Bush I and Reagan adopted the same course.

The Global Gag Rule prohibited U. S. family planning funds to be provided to the U. N. Population Fund because they might reach people through organizations that also provide abortions or abortion referrals.  None of the US money was appropriated for abortions, only for family planning, but what other nations decided to do with their own money kept US family planning funds from reaching their very needy targets.

Because of the gag rule, the Bush administration impounded $34 million in family planning funds annually.  That meant that women who wanted birth control because they live in a war zone, families desiring fewer children because of famine in their land, mothers who wanted no more children because of concern that they might pass the AIDS virus to their infant were left without the help the US could give them.  It is estimated that Bush administration could have prevented 16 million unwanted pregnancies, 7.5 million induced abortions and hundreds of thousands of maternal and infant deaths, had the funding been released to be used as appropriated by Congress.