Dear Board of Health Members,

As a resident of Virginia, I am extremely concerned that the permanent regulations for licensing abortion facilities have not been amended from the termporary regulations. Please consider taking the advisory panel's grandfathering in current clinics, so that they are not forced to go out of business and denying women across the Commonwealth vital access to critical reproductive services. While I understand that there is a desire by Governor McDonnell to restrict access to the abortion facilities for women, please take pity on the thousands of women who rely on these clinics for services much more innocuous and arguably more important than abortion. When these clinics close their doors, they will not just be denying abortions, they will be denying critical health care services to low-income and rural women who cannot access this care elsewhere. Please consider grandfathering in current abortion facilities, per the recommendation of the advisory panel, and only requiring new facilities to meet these new facility regulations. 

If you do decide to keep the permanent regulations as is, I would like justification for why these clinics-- which have not been proven to endanger the lives of women by any measure found by the state--cannot be grandfathered into the new regulations.

Thanks.