Women’s health remains a focus for bipartisan group in Pa.

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    Pennsylvania lawmakers are dusting off proposals focused on women’s health issues and giving them another “go” this legislative session.

     

    The measures would enhance financial protections for victims of domestic violence, prevent state mandates from influencing how doctors advise patients, and seek workplace accommodations for pregnant women, among other things.

    No single proposal tops the agenda for the bipartisan group of lawmakers focusing on making women safer, said Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Allegheny, one of the chairs of the bipartisan Women’s Health Caucus.

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    “These are all, I think, very important to women and, I think, address genuine needs,” said Frankel. “Sometimes we hear about women’s health in the General Assembly that carries more of a political agenda. But I think if you look at these bills, they really go to the roots of what concerns women in Pennsylvania that we’ve been hearing about.”

    Some proposals overlap with economic concerns, such as a plan to ensure pay equity for women and a measure to raise the minimum wage. One effort would create a task force to study health issues for female military veterans.

    The Women’s Health Caucus includes House and Senate lawmakers – some of them Republicans, most of them Democrats. One of the caucus’s past priorities was a ban on “revenge porn,” or intimate partner harassment. That measure was signed into law last year.

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