Abortion Reporting - Hispanic Ethnicity

H.B. 6045
Rep. John Espinoza

Current Status
H.B. 6045 was introduced on May 6, 2008 and referred to the Committee on Judiciary.

Description
H.B. 6045 will make a technical change to the annual abortion report so that we will get accurate data on Hispanic abortions. Since Hispanic is considered an "ethnicity" and not a "race", real data on Hispanic abortions has not been tracked. This information will be invaluable when discussing how to specifically target and reduce the rate of abortions in the Latino community.

Background
P.A. 368 of 1978 requires the physicians who perform abortions fill out a detailed report to be submitted to the Department of Community Health (DCH) within 7 days of the abortion. The DCH compiles this information and submits an annual report. It wasn't until 2002 that "race" was added to the abortion reporting law, as one of the demographics. This small tidbit of information has brought to light a huge phenomena - the disproportionate number of black babies aborted. By discovering this disparity through hard evidence, new educational programs were launched to help bring a new awareness to the plight of blacks who are being destroyed by abortion.