2011 has been a precarious year for women’s health care. Across the nation, political leaders seem determined to undermine the ability of women to access even the most basic health care – especially reproductive health care. The U.S. House recently voted to slash federal funding that provided more than 2 million breast cancer screenings and more than 2 million pap smears in the United States. In the same week, the House also slashed all funding for Planned Parenthood across America.

State legislatures have been equally egregious. Officials in some states have introduced legislation that apparently authorized the murder of some reproductive health care providers and broadly we are seeing some of the most onerous restrictions on reproductive health care offered in decades.

Illinois is not immune. In recent weeks, we have seen a spate of anti-choice bills introduced in Illinois, including:

• House Bill 1919 takes a very deceptive route to limit access to reproductive health care for women in Illinois. The bill mandates that every woman seeking an abortion in Illinois would be offered a viewing of her fetus on ultrasound and would have to attest in writing if they did not want to view the fetal image. This legislation adds nothing to safe abortion practice in the state and interferes with the physician-patient relationship, often in a manner that is harmful to women. Download the fact sheet.

• House Bill 1569 creates Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) as an insurance option for state employees. Then comes the damaging part. The legislation bars not only the use of state-contributed funds for abortion related expenses, but fails to assure that state employees can use their own contributions for abortions – even those that are medically necessary. House Bill 1569 unfairly penalizes those who have chosen a career in public service. Download the fact sheet.

• House Bill 3156 amends the Ambulatory Surgical Treatment Center Act to largely revoke the benefits of the longstanding Consent Decree in Ragsdale v. Turnock, under which abortion facilities have been safely and effectively regulated for the past 20 years. The bill will require facilities that offer safe, early abortions to comply with excessive requirements unrelated to patient health and safety at significant cost and will decrease access to abortion services in Illinois where 92 percent of the counties already do not have an abortion provider. Download the fact sheet.

We will keep watching this legislation. We will continue to oppose it – and other proposals – designed to substitute the judgment of Springfield politicians for the real-life experiences of women across our State. And, we will keep you updated on these proposals as the session moves forward.

According to the Chicago Tribune, state officials are investigating religiously-affiliated foster care agencies are in violation of Illinois' Human Rights Act and other anti-discrimination laws if they refuse to grant foster care licenses to LGBT parents:

Benjamin Wolf of the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois, an attorney who represents juvenile state wards as part of a court-monitored consent decree with DCFS, said limiting the pool of prospective foster care parents because certain religious traditions believe same-sex relationships are sinful is irresponsible when children are in need.

"We don't know for sure if a loving lesbian or gay family turned away from a discriminatory agency is necessarily going to go to another agency because of the disruption and harm caused to them," he said.

The religious institutions' policies might send a hurtful message to the large number of children in the foster care system who landed there after suffering neglect, abuse or rejection because they were gay, some experts say. Marlowe said 240 children out of more than 15,000 in the foster care system currently identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender or questioning.

Foster children should be placed with a relative whenever possible, experts say. If that relative is gay, a religious agency may insist on referring them to a new agency, severing the child's relationship with a caseworker.

"To communicate to that kid that ... you have to change caseworkers in order to get the services you need is a very bad message," Wolf said. "The other thing we're saying to the subpopulation of kids that are gay and lesbian is, 'Once you grow up you can never be a foster parent in our agency' — another troubling message."

A study by the University of Illinois' Children and Family Research Center found some children bounce between foster homes because they face difficulties when they reveal their sexual orientation.

"I don't think you can (overemphasize) the damage done by a disruption," said John Knight, another ACLU attorney.

We hope this issue can be resolved so that vulnerable foster kids can get the care and attention they need in loving homes - regardless of the sexual orientation of the foster parents.

Read the whole article. Meet parents, Corynne and Michelle, who were forced to hide their relationship in order to adopt.

The Chicago Tribune reports that Governor Quinn's decision on SB 3539, abolishing Illinois' death penalty, could come as soon as this week:

Quinn gave no indication of what he'll do with a bill sitting on his desk that would abolish the death penalty in Illinois. It's a historic question for Quinn that will help define his term as governor. And he's had no shortage of advocates on both sides trying to sway him in a state where the death penalty has a high-profile and troubled past.

He's nearly out of time to decide as a March 18 deadline to act looms.

Quinn has not tipped his hand about the weighty decision he faces, which he could announce as early as week's end. The governor supported the death penalty during his re-election campaign, but he's also kept in place the state's decade-long moratorium on executions.

We hope the Governor will do the right thing and sign SB 3539 into law, ending Illinois' broken death penalty system once and for all. Tens of thousands of Illinoisans and people from around the country have urged him to sign it, and we hope you will add your voice as well.

Call Governor Quinn at 312-814-2121 or 217-782-0244 and ask him to end the death penalty in Illinois.