Early this year, I posted on the Knoxville, TN merger of the city’s Baptist Hospital into St. Mary’s (a Catholic system) and the resulting end of access to tubal ligation and vasectomy at Baptist. Access to tubal ligation is now being eliminated at a Nashville, TN Baptist facility as well, as WKRN reports – Baptist Women’s Treatment Center will no longer offer tubal ligation after the end of this year.

WKRN also reports that this change “comes six years after Baptist Hospital and Middle Tennessee Medical Center stopped offering the procedure,” because “the hospitals were acquired by Saint Thomas Health Services, a Catholic health ministry, in 2002.”

A Baptist Hospital spokesperson reportedly issued a statement explaining that “Baptist Hospital and Middle Tennessee Medical Center remain committed to providing and expanding women’s services so more women will have the opportunity to get their care at our hospitals.”

Which sounds like the exact opposite of what has actually happened since 2002 and is happening at the Women’s Treatment Center, unless you believe that “women’s services” only means birthin’ babies – the spokesperson also explained, “Saint Thomas Health Services remains the market leader delivering more babies than any other health system in Middle Tennessee.”

[Thanks to B for letting me know about this]

Tennessee Women to Have Fewer Options for Reproductive Health