Is there a Law to Govern Drug Abuse by Pregnant Women?
Drug Abuse By Pregnant Women
What does the law require?
Among the drugs which triggered the enactment of this law were the heroine and heavy prescription drugs which the pregnant mothers abused and hence their effects depicted in the newborns. It was found that many of the newborns were born with dependency on the drug which the pregnant mother abused. This is what prompted the need to regulate the drug abuse by the pregnant mothers, with sight to protect the newborns from drug addiction.
Is this law in use anywhere in the world?
The law which criminalizes the use of drugs by a pregnant woman has not been embraced in many states of the world. The alternate laws have rarely been used to charge the women who cause harm on the newborn due to use of a certain drug while pregnant. Contrary to these countries, a country known as Tennessee has enacted a law which declares it a crime for any woman to use drugs while she is pregnant.
Drug abuse by pregnant women has been criminalized in Tennessee, and it remains to be seen whether more states will be following the suit. A bill signed into law by the Republican Governor of Tennessee Bill Haslam explicitly criminalizes drug abuse while pregnant. The law came into effect in July and will remain in effect until 1 July 2016. While other US states, such as Alabama and South Carolina, have used fetal harm laws to charge drug-using pregnant women, Tennessee is the first state to adopt this criminalization approach. The new law allows women to be criminally charged with an “assaultive offense for the illegal use of a narcotic drug while pregnant, if her child is born addicted to or harmed by the narcotic drug or for criminal homicide if her child dies as a result of her illegal use of a narcotic drug taken while pregnant”. Supporters of the new law say its aim is to protect babies but a coalition of medical, public health, women’s rights, and social justice groups worked to oppose the bill as it made its way through the Tennessee legislature: “Under the Obama administration, we’ve really tried to reframe drug policy not as a crime but as a public health-related issue, and that our response on the national level is that we not criminalize addiction”, Our national strategy is based on the fact that addiction is a disease. What’s important is that we create environments where we’re really diminishing the stigma and the barriers, particularly for pregnant women, who often have a lot of shame and guilt about their substance abuse disorders”.
Even after signing this bill into law, due to its controversy the Governor of Tennessee was quoted as saying, “I understand the concerns about this bill, and I will be monitoring the impact of the law and regular updates with the court system and health professionals,”
This law has already been put into use and some women have been charged for committing the crime of using heavy drugs while pregnant.
Does this law have any benefit?
Arguably, this law has benefits especially to the newborns. The law protects the newborn from effects of the heavy drugs which the pregnant mother may use. Research has shown that newborns can be born with dependency on the drugs which the mother abused during the pregnancy. This law seeks to reduce these chances of a child being born with dependency in a given drug.
Another advantage of this law is that it can help in the reduction of drug abuse and consequently addiction. Since pregnant mother will fear the course of the law due to the effects of the drugs they abuse during pregnancy. This will make such women to be willing to undergo recovery from drug addiction or stop taking drugs if not yet addicted. This temporal stoppage of taking of the drugs can cause the patient to permanently stop taking the addictive drugs.
What makes this law controversial?
This law has been controversial ever since it was a bill. The main problem with this law is that it focuses on the effect of the drugs on the newborn with a view that they were taken during the pregnancy period. The fact is that some people may be taking the drugs before the pregnancy and stop immediately they become pregnant but still pass the effects of the drugs to the newborn.
Another factor is that this law doesn’t respect the rights of drug addicts, who cannot be able to stop taking the drug during the pregnancy period. Even if they were to enter a recovery period during the pregnancy period, it is not possible to completely stop taking the drugs, since all the recovery programs emphasizes on gradual withdrawal from the drug, which is a process which can cover the entire pregnancy period before completely withdrawing from the drug.
Another controversy of this law is that it also talks about addiction from opioids which are prescription drugs which are likely to be prescribed to the pregnant women for pain killing. This aspect has attracted questioning of the law by doctors who claim that it is very likely that a pregnant woman will be prescribed opioids and thus the law would make the women charged for a mistake they cannot avoid.
Drug Abuse By Pregnant Women
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