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2017 Arkansas Code
Title 20 - Public Health and Welfare
Subtitle 2 - Health and Safety
Chapter 16 - Reproductive Health
Subchapter 19 - Sex Discrimination by Abortion Prohibition Act [Effective January 1, 2018.]
§ 20-16-1902. Legislative findings and purpose. [Effective January 1, 2018.]
Universal Citation: AR Code § 20-16-1902 (2017)
- (a) The General Assembly finds that:
- (1) With regard to sex-selection abortion:
- (A) The victims of sex-selection abortion are overwhelmingly female;
- (B) A sex-selection abortion is used to prevent the birth of a child of an undesired sex;
- (C) The United States, along with other countries, has petitioned the United Nations General Assembly to declare sex-selection abortion a crime against women;
- (D) Countries such as India, Great Britain, and China have taken steps to end sex-selection abortions;
- (E) Women are a vital part of our society and culture and possess the same fundamental human rights as men;
- (F) The United States prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in various areas, including employment, education, athletics, and health insurance;
- (G) It is undesirable to have a distortion in the sex ratio within a society, particularly when there is a shortage of women; and
- (H) Countries with high rates of male preference have experienced ill effects as a result of having an increasing population of young, unmarried men; and
- (2) With regard to maternal health:
- (A) It is undisputed that abortion risks to maternal health increase as gestation increases;
- (B) The risk of death for pregnant women at eight (8) weeks' gestation is one (1) death per one million (1,000,000) and rises to:
- (i) One (1) death per twenty-nine thousand (29,000) abortions between sixteen (16) and twenty (20) weeks' gestation; and
- (ii) One (1) death per eleven thousand (11,000) abortions at twenty-one (21) weeks' gestation or later;
- (C) A woman is thirty-five (35) times more likely to die from an abortion performed at twenty (20) weeks' gestation than she would have been had the abortion been performed in the first trimester;
- (D) A woman is ninety-one (91) times more likely to die from an abortion performed at twenty-one (21) weeks' gestation or later than she would have been had the abortion been performed in the first trimester; and
- (E) Because abortions performed solely based on the sex of a child are generally performed later in pregnancy, women undergoing these abortions are unnecessarily exposed to increased health risks, including an exponentially higher risk of death.
- (1) With regard to sex-selection abortion:
- (b) Based on the findings in this section, the purpose of this subchapter is to:
- (1) Ban abortions performed solely for reasons of sex-selection; and
- (2) Protect women from the risks inherent in late-term abortions.
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