Regarding Abortion, was Kamala Harris correct when she claimed in the Presidential debate that women were bleeding out and dying in hospital parking lots?
But surely this is fake news, surely the abortion bans do not endanger women’s lives, because obviously, aren’t the abortion doctors the murderers?
Women have been bleeding out in parking lots in hospitals when doctors have refused to care for them, fearing lawsuits, though this is rare. Women usually die at home after being turned away from the hospital, or on operating tables, after their care has been delayed for far too long, until they are on death’s doorstep.
Recently, two science reporters for the Atlantic Magazine have interviewed doctors in several states that document when women’s lives have been lost to draconian anti-abortion laws, and more cases where they either nearly died, or were rendered sterile, or both. They remind us of a woman who died in Catholic Ireland due to draconian abortion legislation:
“In the very worst case, neither mother nor baby survives. In 2012, a 31-year-old woman in Ireland named Savita Halappanavar died after her water broke at seventeen weeks. Doctors had refused to end her pregnancy, waiting for the fetus’s heartbeat to stop on its own. When it did, she went into labor, but by then, she had become infected. She died from sepsis three days later. Her death galvanized the abortion-rights movement in Ireland, and the country legalized the procedure in 2018.”
Other recent examples are from the past few months in Deep South red states:
“In Texas, a woman whose water broke at eighteen weeks—far too early for her baby to survive outside the womb—was unable to get an abortion until she became septic. She spent three days in the ICU, and one of her fallopian tubes permanently closed from scarring. In Tennessee, a woman lost four pints of blood delivering her dead fetus in a hospital’s holding area. In Oklahoma, a bleeding woman with a nonviable pregnancy was turned away from three separate hospitals. One said she could wait in the parking lot until her condition became life-threatening.”[1]
Another reporter describes how Amber Nicole Thurman died on August 19, 2022, leaving behind her six-year-old son. “In Georgia, where Thurman lived, abortions became illegal from the time when a ‘detectable human heartbeat’ was present—around six weeks into pregnancy. The law came into effect in late July of that year, at the same time that Thurman, a 28-year-old medical assistant, discovered that she was six weeks pregnant with twins.”
“She scheduled a surgical abortion in North Carolina, took a day off work,” “and got up at 4 a.m. to drive four hours with a friend to the clinic. But they hit traffic, and Thurman missed her appointment. The clinic could not give her another time slot, because so many women came from out of state, who were also facing tough new laws.”
“So, Thurman was offered abortion pills instead,” which are usually safe. But “in less than 5 percent of cases, though, women need another dose, or a procedure called a dilation and curettage (D&C), to empty the uterus completely. In countries and states where abortion is legal, this is a simple and routine procedure that carries little risk.”
“But not in Georgia. Back home, Thurman’s bleeding would not stop. She went to the hospital at 6:51 p.m. on August 18, and medical examinations showed all the classic signs that her abortion was incomplete, and that the tissue remaining inside her was poisoning her blood. But doctors did not give her a D&C. Nor did they do so the next morning, as her condition continued to worsen. When she was finally taken to the operating theater, at 2 p.m., her condition was so bad that doctors started to remove her bowel and uterus.”
“But it was too late. Thurman’s heart stopped on the operating table.”
A Catholic woman also died “in Poland, where abortion is illegal in almost all circumstances. The 33-year-old pharmacist Dorota Lalik died in 2023 after a Catholic hospital refused to offer her a D&C when her water broke at five months. Instead, she was advised to lie down with her legs up. She died of sepsis three days later—the same condition that killed Amber Thurman, and the same condition that killed 31-year-old Savita Halappanavar, the woman whose death from sepsis galvanized the campaign to legalize abortion in Ireland. For every death, there are dozens of near misses.”[2]
The ABC debate moderator was correct when she fact-checked Trump, that there is no state, blue or red, where it is legal to execute babies after they are born. Only about five percent of abortions are performed during the last trimester, when abortion is necessary to protect the life of the mother and where the fetus is not viable outside the womb.[3]
Miscarriages occur in about ten to twenty percent of cases where the woman knows she is pregnant. Typically, the body self-aborts a fetus that it senses it would be malformed or it would be non-viable if it developed further.[4]
Much of this hastily written anti-abortion legislation also bans abortions of ectopic pregnancies, where the embryo attaches itself outside the uterus, often in the fallopian tubes, which occurs in less than two percent of pregnancies. It is impossible for the embryo to develop into a fetus, let alone be viable, and always endangers the life of the mother. While many ectopic pregnancies self-abort without physician intervention, some do not.[5] Why can’t doctors perform ectopic pregnancies without worrying about whether they will be sued or lose their medical license?
These draconian laws against abortion do threaten women’s lives. But politicians not only do not have the medical knowledge to draft compassionate anti-abortion legislation, they fear the political repercussions of being soft on abortion if they offer reasonable amendments to correct shortcomings in the law. They refuse to listen, they refuse to believe that anti-abortion legislation is imperfect.
Often these draconian laws have no exceptions for rape or incest, not even for little girls who are far too young to safely carry a baby to term. Even those laws that carve out an exception that abortions are permitted to save the mother’s life are not enough, because in actual practice doctors cannot say with a hundred percent certainty that the mother’s life is in danger, and when they wait until death is imminent, often when death is inevitable. The abortion laws should instead permit the doctors to act to preserve the mother’s health, rather than her life, as the doctors interviewed suggest.
IS PRO-COMPASSION AND PRO-DOCTOR A BETTER NARRATIVE?
In prior videos, we have questioned whether it is fair to characterize the two sides of the abortion debate as Pro-Life and Pro-Choice.
Is the opposite of pro-life, pro-death? Does everyone who is pro-choice ENJOY KILLING BABIES?
Another related question is, Will those who do not support a radical pro-life, no abortion under any circumstances, BURN IN HELL? This is a meme that totally ignores compassion, that refuses to believe that those considering abortion have real life-changing problems they are facing.
What liberals often do not realize is that the phrase “pro-choice” strikes at the core of religious beliefs, the term “pro-compassion” is a better narrative, a better message. The phrase “pro-choice” implies to a devout believer that there is no absolute truth, that there is no God who represents absolute morality, but that every man can formulate what is right and wrong in their own eyes, that moral truth is relative.
Today Christianity’s reputation is smeared with the suspicion that Christians are not compassionate, that they are instead cruel, that indeed CRUELTY IS THE POINT.[6]
In the matter of abortion, we need to be Pro-Compassion and Pro-Doctor. Whatever the law of the land is, abortion will always be an individual decision, often decided under the advisement of a physician. Let Jesus be the judge, that is His job, not ours.
A Democrat Christian Ponders Abortion and Morality
http://www.seekingvirtueandwisdom.com/a-democrat-christian-ponders-abortion-and-morality/
https://youtu.be/C4rH6qhhw70
Supreme Court Dobbs Case Overruling Roe v Wade: Should Christians be Pro-Compassion? Pro-Doctors?
https://seekingvirtueandwisdom.com/supreme-court-dobbs-case-overruling-roe-v-wade-should-christians-be-pro-compassion-pro-doctors/
https://youtu.be/Jb_vUFnAf3g
Regarding Abortion, Should Christians Be Pro-Compassion? Answering Questions, Further Reflections
https://seekingvirtueandwisdom.com/regarding-abortion-should-christians-be-pro-compassion-answering-questions-further-reflections/
https://youtu.be/ll9wOR0t2yQ
REAL-LIFE MEDICAL DILEMMAS SURROUNDING ABORTION
The dissenting Supreme Court Justices in the Dobbs decision warned that the hastily written decision would likely endanger the care women receive for miscarriages. One problem is that abortifacients, the medications that induce abortions, are often used to treat miscarriages so dead fetus tissue is expelled from the body.
Dobbs enables legislatures that seek to impose draconian penalties on doctors and hospitals who perform abortions. Doctors incur hundreds of thousands of dollars and up to a decade in medical school, and hospitals invest tens of millions of dollars in their facilities, so they are very reluctant to challenge draconian anti-abortion laws that are decided by radical judges who do not care whether they destroy careers and institutions in their decisions. They have no choice but to endanger women’s lives so they can prove that their lives are in danger. The best proof is to wait until women are close to death, so then there is no doubt that their life is in danger!
Sarah Zang interviews Kylie Cooper, an obstetrician specializing in high-risk pregnancies in Idaho, a state that has passed draconian anti-abortion laws. Soon after the law became effective, she had a young mother with a troubled pregnancy. The problem was that not only did her ultrasound indicate the baby likely had Down’s syndrome, he also had a barely formed heart. There was no hope that the baby would survive. Carrying the pregnancy to term would also endanger the mother’s life. However, in Idaho, performing an abortion for any reason whatsoever is a felony. Cooper had to tell the mother she had to get closer to death for her to abort. “Idaho’s abortion ban has no exception for lethal fetal anomalies.”
Subsequent intense lobbying by physicians in Idaho resulted in legislation that did not go far enough in shielding doctors sufficiently so they could make the hard decisions needed to save the lives of mothers with problem pregnancies. Many obstetricians have left Idaho and other states with draconian anti-abortion legislation, and often hospitals in deep red states will airlift problem pregnancies to states where life-affirming care is not illegal. Many hospitals in these problem states have simply closed down their labor and delivery units altogether.
Our reporter Sarah Zhang interviewed an obstetrician on problem pregnancies.
“The cases that most distressed her were” “where the umbilical cord had prolapsed into the vagina, compressing the cord and exposing the baby and mother to infection. When this happens, ‘The loss of the baby is sadly inevitable.’”
Previously at her Catholic hospital, she would suggest terminating a problem “pregnancy before the mother became infected, so she could go home to recover. Now she told patients that they had no choice but to wait until they went into labor or became infected, or until the fetus’ heart stopped beating, slowly deprived of oxygen from its compressed umbilical cord,” lingering for “several days. Thomson did not know that a fetus could take so long to die this way—she was used to intervening much sooner. She found forcing her patients to wait like this ‘morally disgusting.’”
The doctor explained: “Every time I take care of a patient in this scenario, it makes me question why I’m staying here.” “It ate at her to put her own legal interests before her patients’ health. She knew that if a zealous prosecutor decided she had acted too hastily, she could lose years of her career and her life defending herself, even if she were ultimately vindicated. But if she made a ‘self-protective’ decision to delay care and a patient died, she wasn’t sure how she could go on.”
Our obstetrician explains: “From a moral perspective, that’s something that you cannot recover from as a doctor.”[7]
Our author Helen Lewis concludes: “The story of Amber Nicole Thurman’s death” fills me with “cold rage. This did not need to happen. Without Dobbs, it would not have happened. And it will keep happening. Something has gone terribly wrong in America when people who define themselves as pro-life have sentenced a small boy to go to bed tonight, and every night, without his mother.”[8]
DISCUSSING THE SOURCES
Our primary source, The Atlantic Magazine, was founded in 1857 as a literary and abolitionist magazine, and many influential writers over the decades have been featured in its pages. The Atlantic Magazine is my favored news source. Over the past forty years, I have found their articles both balanced and provoking. These articles have more horrifying tragedies caused by the Dobbs decision.
How can Americans become aware of these horrifying tragedies, when they go unreported in the right-wingnut media outlets like Fox News and Newsmax? Will these Americans simply declare that these eyewitness accounts are fake news, since they are not discussed by conservative media? Do we need to wait another decade until every American knows some young mother who has died because hospitals refuse them life-saving care?
The Atlantic Magazine endorsed Abraham Lincoln for President but declined to become directly involved in politics for over a hundred years after the Civil War. They broke this tradition, endorsing Lyndon Johnson and his Great Society reforms, and after that opposing Donald Trump every time he ran for President. By endorsing Lincoln and LBJ, and opposing Trump, the Atlantic Magazine seeks to preserve democracy and civil rights.
Other important sources are the Roe v Wade and Dobbs decisions themselves. They are not intimidating, they are written in plain English, the obscure legal language is easily passed over. In our prior reflections on abortion, we quote both these opinions in depth.[9] We also quote from, and agree with, the sections in the Catholic Catechism that discuss abortion. These and other sources are discussed in these other reflections.
A Democrat Christian Ponders Abortion and Morality
http://www.seekingvirtueandwisdom.com/a-democrat-christian-ponders-abortion-and-morality/
https://youtu.be/C4rH6qhhw70
Also, the current Pope Francis has encouraged balance on the issue of abortion, though vitally important, should not define Catholicism and Christianity.
Pope Francis Mentions Abortion in Gaudete et Exsultate, With a Prayer From Pope Benedict
http://www.seekingvirtueandwisdom.com/pope-francis-mentions-abortion-in-gaudete-et-exsultate-with-a-prayer-from-pope-benedict/
https://youtu.be/jF-fsMvYsak
[1] Sarah Zang, What Abortion Bans Do To Doctors, The Atlantic Magazine, September 12, 2024, October 2024 issue, pp. 68-78, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2024/10/abortion-ban-idaho-ob-gyn-maternity-care/679567/
[2] Helen Lewis, The Women Killed by the Dobbs Decision, The Atlantic Magazine, September 18, 2024, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/09/women-killed-dobbs-decision-abortion/679921/
[3] Mother Jones YouTube Channel, Dems Aren’t Executing Babies, September 17, 2024, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk2YNftAqQ8 and https://www.npr.org/2024/09/10/nx-s1-5107942/abortion-roe-wade-ivf-donald-trump-kamala-harris-debate-2024 and https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-falsely-claims-democrats-support-abortions-after-birth/ and https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/sep/14/baby-homicide-illegal-trump or ask Dr Google about “Democrats Executing Babies.”
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miscarriage
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ectopic_pregnancy
[6] Adam Serwer. The Cruelty is the Point, The Atlantic Magazine, October 3, 2018, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/the-cruelty-is-the-point/572104/
[7] Sarah Zang, What Abortion Bans Do To Doctors, The Atlantic Magazine, September 12, 2024, October 2024 issue, pp. 68-78, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2024/10/abortion-ban-idaho-ob-gyn-maternity-care/679567/
[8] Helen Lewis, The Women Killed by the Dobbs Decision, The Atlantic Magazine, September 18, 2024, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/09/women-killed-dobbs-decision-abortion/679921/
[9] Roe v Wade: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/410/113/ and Dobbs decision: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/597/19-1392/
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