I have come to "know" many women on The Nest (a website I frequent) who have had stillborn babies, miscarriages, and/or trouble conceiving. I found this on one of those women's blogs that I often read (www.fertileramblings.blogspot.com). I know many of my family that reads this don't have blogs, but I want to do my part to help reach the goal of 100,000 pages coming up with this bill on October 15. Also, I think its important that people know of upcoming bills so, if they feel strongly about something, they can write their Representatives to vote "yes" for the bill. If you do have a blog, please participate and put this on yours!
October 15th is National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day in the United States. More than 25,000 children are stillborn in the United States every year leaving mothers, entire families and communities devastated. Estimates of the rate of occurrence of stillbirth make it at least as common as autism.
Stillbirth is not an intractable problem. Greater research would likely significantly reduce it's incidence, but good research requires good data. H.R. 5979: Stillbirth Awareness and Research Act is under consideration by Congress. This proposed bill would standardize stillbirth investigation and diagnosis, thus providing more data for the needed research. Better research means fewer children born still.
On October 15th, remember the thousands of unfinished children lost and the families who remain to grieve them. Honor them by taking action. Let's help pass H.R. 5979.
Action Steps
Step 1. Use Your Blog to Enlist Others-Copy the contents of this entire post and publish it on your blog immediately.
GOAL: Enlist 10 of your readers to spread the word
Step 2. Use Your E-mail to Enlist Others-E-mail 5 bloggers and ask them (nicely and in an unspammy way) to publish these action steps on their blog. Consider contacting celebrity bloggers, political bloggers, medical bloggers, or bloggers who are not part of your reading community.
GOAL: Enlist 3 bloggers outside of your normal blog sphere to spread the word in other online communities.
Step 3. Help Pass the Stillbirth Awareness and Research Act-By October 15th, publish a post on your blog supporting H.R. 5979 Stillbirth Awareness and Research Act. For maximum impact, title your post: "Stillbirth Awareness and Research Act."
GOAL: 1,000,000 Google results on October 15th when that term is searched for. Currently, Google only returns 20,400 pages - most of which have nothing to do with the bill.
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