There are other names, but this is the one we know: Amber Thurman has become the first woman whose death was preventable in relation to an abortion ban since Dobbs. Her name and story have become public as reporting by ProPublica’s Kavitha Surana details how Thurman, a Black 28-year-old mother to a young son who had dreams of becoming a nurse, died a painful, preventable death in Georgia after doctors at a hospital there refused to perform a simple procedure that could have saved her life – because the law did not allow them.
The story highlights the reality of abortion bans, which – even in states like Georgia, with putative exceptions for maternal health – in practice impose death sentences on women who seek to end their pregnancies, or who experience severe complications. They force doctors to choose between medical best practices and their own legal protection – and in the process, the lives of women are treated as alarmingly disposable.
