Nita is selective and demanding and not a compromising person. Twenty years ago, she lost her mother to breast cancer. When I came to congress, there were very few women in clinical trials at the National Institutes of Health. Lowey has also earned accolades by showing her concern about the racial aspects of women's health. The color dimensions of deaths in childbirth are striking.
Black women giving birth have a four to one higher rate of mortality than white women do.
In June, Lowey helped introduce a bill in congress that would provide additional federal funds to study maternal mortality. And in August she crossed political lines to convene a panel on the subject with a Missouri Republican, Representative Jo Ann Emerson. As chair of the House Pro-Choice Task Force, Lowey has also become known as one of congress' strongest advocates of a woman's right to choose. But her position on abortion is far from strident. No one is pro-abortion.