Mar 10, 2019 2 min read

There has been much controversy over the recent bills regarding “late term abortions.” If anyone reads the actual bills, they would see that the bills have nothing to do with granting a woman in her third trimester the option to suddenly decide that she doesn’t want to have a baby and elect to abort it.

The bills are about protecting the parents and doctors from prosecution when the mother’s health is endangered if the pregnancy is not terminated early or when the fetus/baby is so severely deformed that it can not have a good quality of life. If the mother’s health is in danger and the baby is removed early, every effort would be made to sustain the baby’s life. If the fetus or baby has severe deformities and can’t have a good quality of life, even with multiple surgeries, then the baby would be compassionately kept comfortable as it dies.

This is much the same as our laws allow when a child suffers traumatic injury and is taken off life support. The decision would still remain with the parents, no doctor will force a mother to have her baby delivered early because of her health and no parents will be denied the right to have every life-saving surgery or life-support effort for their baby.

These bills are NOT about the issue of being pro-life or pro-choice. They are about babies that are wanted. This about doctors and parents being able to make difficult, heart-breaking choices when the mother’s health is in danger or when their baby is not viable or will never have any real quality of life.

Nowhere in any of these bills is there an option to withhold care or to end the life of a healthy pre-mature or full-term baby!

Deborah Mains

Uniontown