Amber Nicole Thurman’s death from an infection in 2022 is believed to be the first confirmed maternal fatality linked to post-Roe bans.
Reproductive justice advocates have been warning for more than two years that the end of Roe v. Wade would lead to surge in maternal mortality among patients denied abortion care—and that the increase was likely to be greatest among low-income women of color. Now, a new report by ProPublica has uncovered the first such verified death. A 28-year-old medical assistant and Black single mother in Georgia died from a severe infection after a hospital delayed a routine medical procedure that had been outlawed under that state’s six-week abortion ban.
Amber Nicole Thurman’s death, in August 2022, was officially deemed “preventable” by a state committee tasked with reviewing pregnancy-related deaths. Thurman’s case is the first time a preventable abortion-related death has come to public attention since the Supreme Court overturned Roe, ProPublica’s Kavitha Surana reported.
Now, “we actually have the substantiated proof of something we already knew—that abortion bans kill people,” said Mini Timmaraju, president of the abortion-rights group Reproductive Freedom for All, during a call with media. “It cannot go on.”
A lot of pro-birth people argue “obviously things are different if the mother’s life is in danger”, but that ignores that there’s often nothing obvious or definite about the line between “safe” and dangerous. Doctors are erring on the side of caution to avoid potential lawsuits and even jail time, and this is the result. People bleeding out in parking lots, suffering irreversible damage to their body, and people dying.
Prior to the ban, politicians said that they feared doctors would use the “she’s in danger wink wink” defense and made it very very hard to use that defense, and as a result it’s very very hard for women to get the care they need.
Well I guess they get dead women now.
There needs to be a group of lawyers out there with spines of steel to take on a class action lawsuit(or several) to sue the fuck out of each of the states and politicians who pushed these anti-woman laws through and they resulted in women dying or being injured by healthcare being withheld… as mandated by the laws.
These soulless pieces of shit only understand money, getting sued into the ground should get their fucking attention. I’d prefer jailtime, but Donald Dump shows republican shitheads don’t go to jail, so I say class action lawsuit time.
I’ve seen pro-life folks argue that but they frame it like… “the law is fine and it’s a failure of the doctors not being willing to understand the law which led to deaths” and they’ll also follow that up by saying that even if women die, they’re saving more lives by preventing abortions so it’s a net positive.
I find it difficult to argue against that perspective. That is, I disagree with them but also it’s hard to argue when they frame abortions as basically murder.
Do we want doctors to also be lawyers? Spend all their time reading and interpreting laws and studying case precident on every little scenario? There’s a reason why these are two separate and highly trained professions. We have a healthcare problem and we want doctors to spend their time doctoring, not lawyering. Also, it’s never so clear on the medical side anyway, these are judgement calls. So it will go to court and review and all that stuff. The prosecution can always find one doctor to say it wasn’t necessary.
This is the old is fetus life.
Yeah, and the problem there is that logic and science won’t change someone’s mind about it. It’s subjective from their perspective.
Fetus is life, but contained within another life. Therefore, container’s life takes precedence.
Those people are NOT pro-life. They’re anti-abortion. It would be much better to use the correct term instead of pandering to the idea that it is about saving lives.
I think its easier to argue on premises. Why is abortion murder? The bible says life begins at first breath, etc…
Edit: In the US its fairly easy, because you just have to get them to acknowledge its a religious belief. From there its easy to say that ‘well do you believe in the 1st amendment’ and note that establishment of religion is forbidden. Anti abortion laws have to be grounded in reality and from there its harder to argue that fetuses are persons.
The bible also gives a magic abortion potion recipe that only works if the woman cheated, so it’s pretty rich to say that God disapproves.
Plus, Jesus didn’t even mention abortion once. He ordered his followers to feed the poor, but now they fight against feeding the poor and fight for causes Jesus never talked about.
I am beginning to think that true Christians are communists.
Where does the Bible say life begins at first breath? I know that is says this, “13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.” Psalm 139:13 NIV.
If I were to argue on premises, then I would start with a higher premise: Why is murder illegal? If it is my religious belief that murder is wrong, then by your argument doesn’t that make homicide laws a violation of the 1st Amendment and thus unconstitutional?
On a religious basis murder is legal anyway. There’s not a lot of real morality in the bible without serious cherry picking. The slaughter of Jericho, for instance where everyone, even children were slaughtered. At the end of the day law is always determined by human judgement: either through discourse directly or vigorous cherry picking of contradictory statements in holy scripture.
As to life at first breath there’s Genesis 2, Adam became alive at first breath. Then as Zombiepirate noted the prescription for unfaithfulness (numbers 5) is to drink a potion that causes miscarriage, indicating that even if the bible considers a fetus to be a person, it has no problem executing them for the crimes of the mother.
Do we pay doctors for their legal acumen now?
This WHO article mentions this and cites the study
https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/abortion
And conservatives laughing.
And when good faith legislators tried to make it easier for doctors to give care religious groups lobbied to block the fixes.
I am pro-life in general, but that is a good point.
Pro life is not the right term. It’s much better to say you’re anti abortion than to pretend it’s about saving lives.
Not really. If I was anti abortion I wouldn’t be proponent of it in most cases. You are making shit up.
The only assumption he’s making is that, if you refer to yourself as “pro-life”, you mean what everyone else in America who calls themselves “pro-life” means. It’s a reasonable assumption, I mean, that’s the way words work.
Not even that since it doesn’t really prevent abortion or pregnancy in general. It’s just anti-choice. Or anti-woman.
I think you all need a new name for yourselves. It sounds absurd at this point
What do you mean? I am not a member of any group, and I don’t know how is being pro life absurd. In fact I don’t understand how being opposed to killing a baby that is a month or two away from being born without valid reason (or any other reason that is non-threatening to woman’s mental or physical health after certain point of pregnancy) is that extreme.
The name “pro-life” is absurd. Too far from reality
I get it’s risky and money is needed to survive, and prison is bad, and all, but it seems a bit hypocritical for doctors to violate their modern day version of the Hippocratic Oath.
Especially the part where it says:
That’s a place where life-saving decisions should always transcend law, and there should be a law (since we can’t go on gentleman’s agreements anymore) that says as much to cut out this partisan horse shit that vacillates and trends downward every year.
Can’t believe it’s 2024 and our big accomplishment is that America figured out how to politicize the human body, and the uterus in particular.
When they can is the key phrase. When the law says you can’t it’s no longer a doctors problem. This is 100% on the stupid politics.
They rationalize it by saying that they can’t help anyone if they are sent to jail. It is partly true so I don’t think we should blame the doctors here.
It’s still malpractice. Doesn’t matter if it’s illegal.
Which is why we’re also seeing entire maternity wards shut down. Doctors can’t provide care without risking being jailed or being sued for malpractice, so they just won’t practice at all.
That happened to a nearby hospital where I live and it’s an abortion friendly state. It’s because hospitals don’t make any money from it compared to other departments like surgery and cancer care where they can bill Medicaid/Medicare out the ass.
Ah, we can blame capitalism for that one.