The nightmarish experience of an expectant mother in Texas underscores why lawmakers, in their zeal to protect the unborn at all costs, should have no business telling doctors how to do their jobs. The Houston woman, Elizabeth Weller, badly wanted a child and was heartbroken when her water broke at 18 weeks of pregnancy. The baby’s chances of survival were minuscule, and a painful, suffocating death was assured without amniotic fluid to surround the baby in the womb for the remaining weeks of pregnancy.
But Texas lawmakers had so confused the rules about when an abortion could legally occur under such circumstances that doctors feared criminal prosecution if they acted in the best interests of both the child and mother. So they had to force Weller to carry her dying baby as it began decaying inside her. The story was recounted last week in a tear-inducing, 11-minute segment on National Public Radio.
Weller told NPR that, although she believes in a woman’s right to choose, she personally would never choose to have an abortion. She and her husband wanted this baby. But their experience turned into an object lesson of why all-encompassing laws devised by people with little or no medical experience can inflict the worst kinds of harm in the name of saving lives.
At 18 weeks, Weller’s water broke. It occurred before the Supreme Court’s June 24 ruling overturning Roe v. Wade but after Texas had already imposed laws banning abortion and allowing for anyone to sue an abortion provider after fetal cardiac activity is detected. The vagueness of the law regarding exceptions for medical emergencies is what caused Weller’s doctors to balk because, even though her water had broken, the baby’s heartbeat was still audible and, technically, Weller’s life was not yet in danger. The only time Weller could be regarded as suffering a medical emergency would be if the baby reached an advanced state of decay and prompted a severe uterine infection.
Weller was in significant danger, but not yet the right kind of danger. Days later, she had a foul discharge and began vomiting, but it still wasn’t enough for the doctors to act. Far more hideous episodes were to follow.
Finally, an East Texas doctor who became aware of her plight stepped forward, saying, “This is ridiculous.” He induced labor, and Weller gave birth to her stillborn daughter.
Some might dismiss this as a rare exception, but it’s not. Such examples will arise again and again until lawmakers come to grips with their own medical incompetence and find a more rational middle ground. The suffering they are causing goes beyond cruelty and will continue to create unintended victims out of women who want their babies but who cannot force Mother Nature to accommodate the whims of amateurs on red state legislative floors.
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