nes

I'm curious on the make-up of this forum.

In case you don't know what a partial birth abortion is...

The procedure is usually done after 20 weeks (4 1/2 months) of pregnancy. Also if the procedure was done after 25 weeks (even before), but at step 3 instead deliver the whole baby instead of leaving the head in the womb, the baby would have good chances of living with care.

Felicity

Only on a dead baby that died of natural processes prior to birth. Live babies can be delivered via c-section and they can be made comfortable until natural death without heroic lifesaving methods being employed.

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Jerry

If the baby's already dead, just deliver the body.
There's no reason to cut into the skull of a dead baby and suck out it's brains during delivery.

Jerry

Performing a partial-birth abortion should be a Capitol offence, and I would be more then ecstatic to execute the physician myself.

1069

Approximately 1 in 2000 fetuses develop hydrocephalus in utero.
Usually not discovered until late in the second trimester, it is not unusual for the fetal head to be as large as 50 centimeters (nearly 20 inches) in diameter. It may contain upwards of two gallons of cerebrospinal fluid. As a reference point, the average adult skull is about 7 to 8 inches in diameter.

So, yes; whether the fetus in such cases is already dead, or whether it will die shortly after birth, there is a need to "drill into the skull", drain some of the cerebrospinal fluid, and collapse the skull, making it possible for the skull to pass through the woman's birth canal without killing her.
There is no reason she should subject herself to the risks inherent in major abdominal surgery in order to deliver a dead fetus or one that won't live anyway, when vaginal delivery is safer for her. Not unless she just feels like it.

Even in less severe cases of hydrocephalus, where the fetus does stand a chance of survival, it is usually necessary for doctors to puncture the skull, insert a shunt, and drain excess fluid from the head in order to relieve pressure from the brain, either while the fetus is still in utero or shortly after birth.

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Jerry

That's an exception to the rule, just like Justifiable Homicide, and I accept it.

Felicity

Could you provide a source for your numbers? And this number includes ALL cases of hydrocephaly? What is the incedence of the severe case you describe?
I do not think this is accurate. Please provide a source. "not unusual?"--I think that size is quite unusual--in fact--extraordinarily rare.

It's not the cranial surgery that is objectionable--it's the killing and then the abuse of the corpse unnecesarily.

OKgrannie

Banning PBA will not save a single "baby". It is only ONE procedure that can be used.

Gambling With Abortion (Harpers.org)
The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban does not prohibit what most people think it prohibits. It is not a late-abortion law. Apart from a single quoted remark in its “findings” section, which is a kind of declaratory preface, the ban contains no mention at all of third-trimester abortion, or of any gestational point in pregnancy. It criminalizes only by method, outlawing some actions during a pregnancy termination but not others, meaning that as practical legislation—isolated from its mission, that is, and considered solely as a directive on what physicians may and may not do in a procedure room—it makes clear ethical sense only to people who don't spend much time thinking about abortion. Defending the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban in court, as teams of Justice Department lawyers were dispatched this spring and summer to do, requires arguing to judges that pulling a fetus from a woman's body in dismembered pieces is legal, medically acceptable, and safe; but that pulling a fetus out intact, so that if the woman wishes the fetus can be wrapped in a blanket and handed to her, is appropriately punishable by a fine, or up to two years' imprisonment, or both.

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FallingPianos

I voted yes with light restrictions. the restriction being that the death of the fetus must in some way aid in its removal from the womans body - same restriction I would support for all post-viable abortions. it should be left up to the doctor to decide whether that is the case.

one problem with "partial birth abortion" is that it is not medical termonlogy. most bans are meant to apply to intact dilaton and extraction, which is usually done between the 20th and 24th week of gestation, and account for about .17% of all abortions. however, the language of most bans is loose and could be interpreted to apply to dilation and evacuation, which is done as early as 13 weeks. abortions between 13 and 20 weeks account for about 9% of all abortions in the US.

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Jerry

"Light restrictions" only means you can't have lta instead of delivery the day you are due.

Under "light restrictions", you could choose to have a completely elective and medically unnecessary lta for absolutely any reason you wish to imagine.