Drafter
Clerk 06/29/2017
Title
A RULE AND REGULATION relating to disclosure of information by limited service pregnancy centers; adding a new Title 4A to the BOH Code; enacted pursuant to RCW 70.05.060, including the latest amendments or revisions thereto.
Body
BE IT ADOPTED BY THE KING COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH:
SECTION 1. Findings:
A. The King County Board of Health finds that the Board of Health has a compelling interest in ensuring that women who might be pregnant are notified about whether or not the limited service pregnancy centers they visit for ultrasound, pregnancy testing or pregnancy diagnosis or pregnancy options counseling are health care facilities. Lack of such a notification presents a threat to the public health because it might delay women from having the necessary information to seek comprehensive family planning and reproductive health care services or obstetric health care available elsewhere, including information enabling them to seek free or low-cost avenues of receiving those services.
B. All women in King County, regardless of income, should have access to comprehensive family planning and reproductive health care services. Further, all pregnant women in King County, who might wish to continue their pregnancies, should have access to obstetric health care. Ensuring access to those services has been shown to be critical for saving lives and reducing ill-health for both women and their children. For women who might be pregnant, particularly if their pregnancies were unintended, access to those services might be even more critical.
C. Research has shown that investments in comprehensive sexual and reproductive health result in benefits such as: preventing unintended pregnancies, which can improve birth spacing and outcomes; improving maternal health; increasing prevention or early diagnosis of breast or cervical cancer; and preventing, diagnosing and treating sexually transmitted infections, including those that could be trans...

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