Lincoln Project is known for its attack ads against Donald Trump. Some of them going too far in the minds of some critics. The Fred Trump ad is one that comes to mind as being criticized for going a little too far in attacking Trump. Their new abortion ban ad is heartbreaking. I cried when I first watched it and again when I played it to test that the video was properly embedded.
Georgia Abortion Ban Deaths
Amber Thurman found out she was pregnant at 6 weeks—on the same day that Georgia’s 6-week abortion ban went into effect. She was forced to travel out of state for medical care.
Already a single mother to a 6-year-old son, Amber was about to start nursing school. Being a nurse was a dream of hers. She couldn’t afford a second child. She wanted to go to school and realize her dream. Actually, the reasons for Amber’s decision have no relevance in this story. I’m removing them. It is a woman’s decision and she should never be expected to provide anyone with the “reason” for her decision.
Reasons are irrelevant just as there’s no reason to mention her race. Some reporters/writers will just automatically announce the race of a person they are writing about unless they are white. In other words, if there is no mention of a person’s race, by default they are white.
No! Unless race is an important part of the story, there’s no reason to mention it. If I had decided to discuss the fact that maternal mortality rates are over two times higher for black mothers. That would make the race of the women in this article an important factor that alters the nuance of mother’s dying in Georgia. Without acknowledging their race, their connection to the maternal mortality statistics would be severed and have less of an impact/educational value. Let me shake off this ADD moment and “weave” back into what I was saying.
Prior to my tangent I had recognized the irrelevance of Amber’s reason(s) for choosing abortion, which sparked “the irrelevance of race” rant, which is what would happen to any true social justice warrior. 🤪
Back to “women shouldn’t have to share the reason(s) behind the choice they made— whether it’s about abortion or any other decision in their lives…”
Women and their doctors should be the ones deciding if and when they are ready for an 18+ year commitment of time, financial responsibility, and emotional and mental wellness.
Can we also take a moment (I will fight against going off on a full rant here) to recognize that men always have the right to choose abortion—aborting the relationship and responsibilities of being a father. Women don’t have that option (besides adoption, but we aren’t getting into the nuance of that decision right now.)
Because Amber had to travel out of state to North Carolina, for medical care, the long journey resulted in her missing the appointment.
The doctor prescribed the abortion pill, which is safe in the majority of cases. In fact, it’s safer than drugs like Tylenol, Viagra, and penicillin. Serious problems are extremely rare.
Amber started bleeding heavily at home the following day. A tiny piece of tissue had remained in her uterus. If it wasn’t removed, she would continue to bleed and infection would set in. The doctor who prescribed the pill knew she needed a D&C procedure to remove the tissue and stop the bleeding and he said that he would perform it for free in his office…in North Carolina.
Before she could make arrangements to travel to North Carolina again, the loss of so much blood caused Amber to black out in the hallway of her home. She was taken by ambulance to a hospital in Georgia—where having an abortion or an “abortion-adjacent” medical procedure is illegal. It’s also a crime for doctors to perform an abortion or “abortion-adjacent” procedures.
It’s illegal, that is, unless the woman is “about to die.”
Because the D&C procedure Amber needed can also be used to perform abortions, the doctors were too scared to treat her until she was “dying” so as not to risk losing their license to practice medicine—or worse—spend the rest of their lives in prison.
As she lay in the hospital bed, for days, suffering, Amber’s infection worsened and she became septic. Sepsis is a condition that occurs when an infection has spread into the bloodstream and bacteria travels throughout the body, and infects internal organs. Septic shock is a life-threatening condition that occurs when organs start shutting down and delirium sets in from an extended period of high body temps, inflammation in the brain, and changes to the blood/brain barrier. When Amber’s organs began shutting down, the doctors had no choice but to rush her into emergency surgery—it was so urgent that they went in through her abdomen vs through her vulva in the case of the D&C procedure. But her organs were shutting down and her heart wasn’t strong enough to handle surgery. Amber died on the table.
Side Note: In 2015, I started shaking in 90 degree heat and my temperature was 104. I wasn’t the best advocate for myself back then so I just went to bed. My kids said I was throwing up all night. I was still asleep at 4:00 the next afternoon so my mother handed me my shoes and said we were going to urgent care. She told me later that I just stared at her. I don’t remember anything after going to bed the night before. I was taken to the hospital by ambulance and diagnosed with septic shock and sepsis-associated delirium. I woke up tied down to a hospital bed and was told I had been combative and kept pulling out my IVs. I had tiny hard nodules in my palms and the bottoms of my feet which were septic emboli (blood clots and bacteria from an infected heart) thrown from my heart after the infection reached my mitral valve.
The point of my side note is to say that I have experienced sepsis, septic shock and endocarditis (heart infection), and the pain over every inch of my body was horrendous. I couldn’t even walk! I had open heart surgery after being in the hospital on IV antibiotics for 30 days. At home, I had to inject syringes full of antibiotics into a catheter that went directly into my heart. After the valve repair, making sure all of the infection was gone for good was extremely important. The thought of Amber and other women like her lying in a hospital with sepsis until they were seconds from death is unimaginable.
The second woman who lost her life in Georgia, Candi Miller, started bleeding and was afraid of being accused of attempting an abortion when she thought she was experiencing a miscarriage. Instead of seeking help, she lay in bed with her toddler and ended up dying there.
These abortion bans have caused many women to “bleed out” in cars and bathrooms because doctors are too afraid to treat them if they aren’t “near death.” How do you allow a woman to get to that point without waiting too long? That’s the problem with rules like that one. Provide care too soon and the doctor risks legal repercussions. Wait a minute too long and it’s too late to save her life.
Recently, a woman experiencing a miscarriage in California, where abortion is legal, ended up at a Catholic Hospital where a doctor informed her that she needed an emergency abortion. None of the doctors would perform the procedure for religious reasons. Instead, she was sent away with a bucket and some towels.
Whether it’s an abortion ban or a religious conviction preventing care for women experiencing reproductive health emergencies, they end up suffering permanent medical complications or don’t survive.
President Biden’s Executive Order stating that doctors and hospitals must treat pregnant women in crisis is a game-changer when it comes to situations like those mentioned here. The HHS came out afterwards to clarify that emergency medical treatment also includes abortion services.
Until we have seen it in practice for some time, we don’t know if every state’s laws and their physicians will change to honor the executive order. If a state refuses to change its law sentencing doctors to prison, doctors in that state aren’t going to comply.
