Guest Post by Morbo
Anyone wondering what some parts of America will look like once [tag]Roe v. Wade[/tag] is overturned needs to read Jack Hitt’s recent article in The New York Times Magazine.
Be warned, this piece is not easy going. It’s well written and extremely informative, but if you’re like me, it’s going to make you pretty angry and disgusted.
The article, titled “[tag]Pro-Life[/tag] Nation,” deals with [tag]El Salvador[/tag], where abortion is illegal for any reason. No exceptions. [tag]Abortion[/tag] is technically illegal in many South American countries, but usually enforcement is lax. Not in El Salvador. In that country, anyone who seeks an abortion, provides one or aids a woman in getting one can be imprisoned. Sentences range from two to eight years. If the [tag]fetus[/tag] is determined to have been viable, sentences are 30 to 50 years.
Medical professionals are required to report any woman they suspect might have undergone an illegal abortion. In these cases, courts can and do require women to undergo invasive examinations. In some cases, women who are suspected of receiving abortions and are recovering in hospitals are arrested and handcuffed to their beds so they can’t evade the authorities.
The system also creates a totalitarian network of informants. Women who have had illegal abortions are offered a reduced sentence if they will rat out the providers. Nurses are encouraged to report on doctors who may be providing abortions.
What most appalled me most was the way doctors in El Salvador must deal with ectopic pregnancies. In this situation, a fertilized egg moves down the fallopian tube but gets stuck there. The fetus continues to grow until the organ ruptures. Even though ectopic pregnancies cannot lead to a live birth, it is illegal in El Salvador to remove the fetus from the fallopian tube unless it is dead.
According to Sara Valdes, the director of the Hospital de Maternidad, women coming to her hospital with ectopic pregnancies cannot be operated on until fetal death or a rupture of the fallopian tube. “That is our policy,” Valdes told me. She was plainly in torment about the subject. “That is the law,” she said. “The D.A.’s office told us that this was the law.”
Valdes estimated that her hospital treated more than a hundred ectopic pregnancies each year. She described the hospital’s practice. “Once we determine that they have an ectopic pregnancy, we make sure they stay in the hospital,” she said. The women are sent to the dispensary, where they receive a daily ultrasound to check the fetus. “If it’s dead, we can operate,” she said. “Before that, we can’t.” If there is a persistent fetal heartbeat, then they have to wait for the fallopian tube to rupture. If they are able to persuade the patient to stay, though, doctors can operate the minute any signs of early rupturing are detected. Even a few drops of blood seeping from a fallopian tube will “irritate the abdominal wall and cause pain,” Valdes explained. By operating at the earliest signs of a potential rupture, she said, her doctors are able to minimize the risk to the woman.
Of course, by the time the fallopian tube ruptures, the woman has a good chance of losing a lot of blood and going into shock.
Naturally, El Salvador’s draconian law affects mostly poor women. Wealthy women in El Salvador who want abortions simply jet off to Miami.
American anti-abortion activists want exactly what El Salvador has: a ban on all abortions for any reason. They argue that if a “woman’s health” exemption is granted, doctors will use it as a loophole and keep performing most abortions.
The political leaders who back the anti-abortion movement dance all around the issue of penalties. The El Salvador experience shows that this is in no way a theoretical concern. A ban on abortions, to be effective, must be backed by vigorous enforcement. Thus, the states that ban abortion will face the same issues present in El Salvador.
Are we really going to arrest women as they lie in hospital beds? Are we going to force them to endure ectopic pregnancies until their fallopian tubes burst? Are we going to establish a network of informants in hospitals and clinics and empower courts to drag women merely suspected of having abortions into examining rooms for probing?
This may be what some people in South Dakota, Mississippi, and Utah want. It will be interesting to see how the rest of the country reacts.