Pro-Choice Massachusetts Foundation

CONTACT:

15 Court Square Suite 900
Boston, MA 02108
617-556-8800 x12
www.prochoicemass.org

Andrea Miller, Executive Director

DESCRIPTION:

Founded in 1979 promote access to the full range of reproductive choices, including abortion and contraception, PCM approaches its 30th anniversary as a national leader in its field, especially in promoting Emergency Contraception (EC). In 2001, they founded the Massachusetts Emergency Contraception Network, which today includes more than 500 organizations and individuals working to ensure the broadest possible access to EC. In 2005, after a three-year intensive lobbying effort, Massachusetts enacted a law “…to Provide Timely Access to Emergency Contraception” enabling trained pharmacists to dispense EC through physicians’ standing orders, and requiring hospital emergency rooms to make EC available to victims of rape. The Network has followed-through to ensure effective implementation of the law, by monitoring hospitals’ compliance in treating rape survivors, and by conducting workshops for pharmacists, health care providers, community health centers, outreach workers, and women and teens, and public forums. The Network has a variety of fact sheets available on its website and is distributing 20,000 low-literacy brochures in both English and Spanish to health care providers and community organizations across the state. Beyond EC and following its successful precedent, PCM has mounted two statewide initiatives, focusing on systemic changes to meet reproductive health needs of 18-26 year-old women, and reducing racial, ethnic, and socio-economic disparities in health care among Boston teenagers. You can join the Network and share in its successes.

(2008: HUMAN SERVICES: Girls & Women: Health)