Because they apparently don’t have to do, Utah legislators are playing doctor. Unfortunately, they’ve decided to do this at the expense of women’s health and safety at an extremely vulnerable moment in their lives.
On March 28, 2016, Gov. Gary Herbert signed into law SB 0234, which is euphemistically titled the “Protecting Unborn Children Amendment.” As a first-of-its-kind in the nation law, it requires women who are seeking abortions at or beyond 20 weeks of gestation to be given anesthesia by the person(s) performing the abortion. Supporters of the bill argue that fetuses at the twenty week stage of development may be capable of feeling pain and therefore deserve to be anesthetized. The anesthesia is to be delivered to the fetus through the body of the mother.
This almost makes sense, except that it doesn’t. Most medical experts agree that there is no credible scientific evidence that a fetus of 20 weeks experiences pain. According to a literature review in the Journal of the American Medical Association, “pain perception probably does not function before the third trimester [28 weeks],” and therefore “discussions of fetal pain for abortions performed before the end of the second trimester should be non-compulsory.” The misguided suggestion that a fetus feels pain caused by the act of abortion is largely a creation of Utah’s male legislators in general, and Sen. Curtis Bramble in particular, who are desperate to find ways to chip away at a woman’s right to control what happens to her body. These legislators are playing doctor. And they want to win.
To be clear, no one — and I mean no one — wants a baby to feel pain. Probably the person who tops that list in each instance is the mother carrying that fetus. Abortion foes, however, have staked out what they deem to be the moral high ground on this issue and kicked the safety and well-being of the mother, not to mention her right to make her own decisions, to the curb. In the face of overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary, they have declared they believe that fetuses not yet viable are capable of feeling pain. They know better than physicians, and they know better than mothers. The legislature has waddled into the privacy of the examination room, where mothers and their caregivers interact, and settled itself down squarely between the two.
Let’s consider for a moment what this means to those mothers who seek abortions at 20 weeks. By the way, for the most recent year for which data is available, 2014, there were 17 such women in the state of Utah. That’s it.
Prior to the passage of SB 0234, a woman in collaboration with her physician could opt for anesthesia. Now that choice has been ripped from her. Without her consent, this new law requires that she either be given a general anesthetic, which will render her unconscious and forced to be connected to a breathing tube, or sedated with a heavy dose of narcotics, which carries with it a heavy dose of risks to the mother’s health. But again, the legislators are playing doctor here. They know better.
Now consider the position in which the physicians find themselves, thanks to SB 0234. According to a literature review in the Journal of the American Medical Association, “pain perception probably does not function before the third trimester [28 weeks]” and therefore “discussions of fetal pain for abortions performed before the end of the second trimester should be non-compulsory.”
Prior to the passage of SB 0234, physicians who administered anesthesia to women having abortions were required to advise their patients about the health risks and anesthesia-related side effects of adding drugs to their procedures. Not only does SB 0234 not contain any such requirement but it rather asks physicians to inform their patients that “substantial medical evidence from studies concludes that an unborn child who is at least 20 weeks gestational age may be capable of experiencing pain during an abortion procedure.” In other words, it requires physicians to dispense information many consider to be unfounded and untrue. Legislators playing doctor. Physicians becoming liars.
It is time to call this law what it is: another foothold for legislatures to chip away at the protections guaranteed women by the 1973 Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade.
It is worth consideration to remind ourselves how the Supreme Court reached its unanimous decision in that landmark case. The justices looked to the 14th Amendment of the Constitution and its Due Process Clause to find that women were guaranteed a right to privacy within which to make decisions about abortion. The justices, however, also found that the states possessed two legitimate interests under which they could regulate abortions. The first was to protect the health of the woman, and the second was to defend the potentiality of the human life.
It seems clear that SB 0234 does nothing to protect the health of the woman, which is the first of the legitimate state interests. With regard to the second, the defense of human life, the administration of a narcotic to an unborn fetus through the body of the mother hardly rises to the standard.
And yet, once again we find a legislature substituting its own judgment, absent any well-documented supporting research, muscling itself squarely into the singular relationship between physician and patient. Why?
It occurs to me that this is an argument that just never goes away. Why are women treated to such pervasive subjugation? Why is it that a woman’s control over what happens to her own body is considered subordinate to the will of legislators?
There’s an image making the rounds lately on social media, and it haunts me as I write this column. In it, a woman lies on the ground, balled into a near-fetal position. Men surround her, jeering. One draws back his foot to kick her. Her crime? Demanding her right to vote.
Is this what the future holds for all women? Does the past truly predict the future? Is it that we will continually be forced to fight for what should rightfully be ours to begin with?
What is it about women that makes us the target of this sort of gender discrimination? I’m sure I don’t know what it is, but I do know this: I’m grateful beyond words for women like the woman in the picture lying on the ground. She fought for herself, and she fought for me. I’m grateful for the physicians who stood against the Utah legislators, fighting bias with fact. I’m grateful for every woman who realizes that we can never relax.
We must call out our legislators. We will not stand silently by while these legislators play doctor with our lives.
They have no right.
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Ms Mansfield essentially asks, what is it about 50 % of the population that is controlled by the whims of the second half of the population.
Over the years I’ve learned a bully is only effective when that “wanna be” has followers to prance in front of, be boisterous in front of, who has an inherent scheming mind, and wants to lead by dictate.
Those organizations with the most dictates of social behavior and submission to authority are prime examples of those who use others to enrich themselves.
This issue as it concerns the recent focus on a none civic issue by the legislature; is more in line with the European Inquisition and rule of monarchs.
We fought for a different form of government.
It was called the American Revolution.