The Woman's Book of Choices

Book excerpt: The New Our Bodies, Ourselves calls menstrual extraction (ME) "a powerful example of medical research done by women on and for ourselves." As the safest and most effective of the techniques that can be performed on women by women, independently of any legal restrictions that may be imposed on doctors in the coming months and years, menstrual extraction is today at the center of the raging abortion debate, serving both symbolically and practically as the line of first defense against recent rollbakcs of women's reproductive rights in the nation's courts. A Woman's Book of Choices chronicles the history of ME, the currently accepted standard of ME practice, and its legal ramifications, and offers accounts of actual ME procedures. It also describes the who range of other abortion alternatives, from state-of-the-art clinical abortions to folk remedies, for women who may be considering terminating a pregnancy. In addition, there is a comprehensive chapter that is directed to medical personnel who may be providing abortion care, and a chapter on the French-developed abortion pill, RU-486.