On June 15 2021, NAPW provided comments to the Massachusetts Senate Committee on Children, Families, and Persons with Disabilities and Chair Senator Adam Gomez in strong support of bill H.221. This bill will reduce unnecessary reporting and counterproductive family separation, and thereby benefit maternal, fetal, and child health.
Experts Address the Rights of Pregnant Patients to Informed Consent, Bodily Integrity, and Medical Decision Making
What happens when a pregnant patient exercises their right to medical decision making? Is there any justification to override a pregnant patient’s consent? Join NAPW for a discussion featuring leaders in bioethics, medicine, law and birth justice about pregnant patients' rights to informed consent, bodily integrity, and medical decision making and the trauma that forced medical interventions can inflict on pregnant people.
Dear Friends and Allies,
As the spring season offers hope of a new start, we are grateful for science, vaccines, and the possibility of reconnecting in person with our friends, colleagues, and loved ones. But as we enter this season, it is imperative that we don’t lose sight of the vast inequalities exposed during pandemic.
In July 2020, NAPW joined numerous allies including Ancient Song Doula Services and Black Mammas Matter in signing an open letter that served as a national call for birth justice and accountability. NAPW knows that just as police misuse their authority against Black, Brown, and Indigenous people on the streets, they also do so in hospitals and delivery rooms and with the assistance of health care professionals.
Dear Friends and Allies,
The Biden-Harris victory reflects massive organizing efforts and leadership, especially by Black women. The occasion also marks the election of the first — but not the last — Vice President who is a woman, Black, of South Asian descent, and the daughter of immigrants.
National Advocates for Pregnant Women mourns the death of George Floyd and the death of every Black person murdered by police forces in the United States. We recognize the systemic problem of police brutality and join the Black Lives Matter movement in calling for immediate and radical change.
In NAPW's study, Arrests of and Forced Interventions on Pregnant Women in the United States, 1973-2005: Implications for Women's Legal Status and Public Health, Jeanne Flavin and Lynn M. Paltrow documented the fact that an overwhelming and disproportionate number of arrests and detentions were brought against women of color and especially low-income Black women.
NAPW Senior Staff Attorney Amber Khan and Director of Legal Advocacy Nancy Rosenbloom attended and spoke at this year’s American Bar Association National Conference on Parent Representation in Washington, D.C. in April 2019. This conference “is designed for advocates who focus on parent advocacy in the child welfare system”, including many parent defense attorneys from around the country.
On May 31, 2019, National Advocates for Pregnant Women (NAPW), along with Movement for Family Power and 20 non-governmental organizations, activists, public defense offices, academics, and others who work every day to advance the human rights of pregnant and parenting people submitted a set of recommendations to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women regarding the United States child protection and foster system.
In December 2018, NAPW Senior Staff Attorney Amber Khan delivered a presentation to the AIDS Institute’s state-wide Women Who Use Drugs Workgroup, part of the New York State Department of Health, on the federal Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) and its connection to pregnancy and drug use.
