Board of Health,

In just two years, inspections have exposed widespread health and safety violations including blood splattered exam tables and equipment, unsterilized needles, incomplete lifesaving equipment, violations of Virginia parental consent laws, an absence of reporting of possible cases of child abuse, and many more deficiencies.Those who make the decision to have an abortion should be able to have it done in an environment that meets basic health and safety standards, is clean, and where the staff is trained. These health and safety standards simply ensure that abortion centers meet common sense standards of care to ensure womens health is paramount.The abortion industry claims to be safe, but 300 health and safety violations prove otherwise. It is an industry whose opinion cannot be trusted on any of the standards, including those involving construction.Emergencies happen frequently at abortion centers and emergency personnel need to be able to get to patients in need and that involves having doorways and hallways wide enough to get emergency equipment to women in medical crisis.Planned Parenthood alone is a $1 billion industry. It has the money to bring its abortion centers into compliance with these reasonable health and safety standards. It simply has to choose if it is going to spend it on womens health instead of political campaigns. Richard M. Lindenauer