The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003: Republicans drum up support

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The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003: Republicans drum up support from religious right
By Tom Seabaugh
24 October 2003

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Most of the D&X “abortions” the Republicans in the Senate (and their allies in the religious right) have been referring to in their graphic descriptions in Congress involved fetuses with massive cranial abnormalities, and the doctors were forced to destroy the head of the fetus to allow it to be extracted without damaging the mother. In these cases, the fetus had developed hydrocephalus—a condition that can result in the fetal head reaching a diameter of 50 centimeters, or about 20 inches! The average adult human head, by comparison, has a diameter of about 7 to 8 inches. Because approximately one in two thousand fetuses develops hydrocephalus, as many as five thousand fetuses in the US each year are diagnosed with the condition. Because hydrocephalus is hard to detect before late in the second trimester, around 500 women in the US are forced to undergo the D&X procedure each year or be killed by attempting to deliver a hydrocephalic fetus. In these cases, given the desperate conditions, it is more understandable that the doctor could be required to drain the head of the fetus while it was in the uterus in order to save the mother.

Where caesarean sections have been attempted to try to save hydrocephalic fetuses, the fetus has almost always died following the surgery, and in the rare case of a fetus surviving, it has exhibited severe mental retardation. The mothers who survive the caesarean section can be rendered infertile, and the risk of infection is very high. It is unclear as of the writing of this article what the fate of women bearing hydrocephalic fetuses will be under the PBABA.

However, these facts are conveniently left out of the Republican description of the D&X procedure. There is no mention of hydrocephalus in the act passed Tuesday, merely a gruesome account of what is meant by “partial-birth abortion.” Also, because most states do not have strict reporting regulations, and because of the haziness surrounding what exactly constitutes a “partial-birth abortion” (a term invented by the Republican Party), the exact number of procedures carried out annually that may be affected by the PBABA is unknown. Apparently this did not concern the legislature.

Most of the testimony read in the Senate hearings was graphic descriptions of the process of D&X and religious invocations. Frankly, any medical procedure, described in vivid enough detail, can sound like an atrocity—especially if the extreme circumstances surrounding its undertaking and the rarity with which the procedure is performed are suppressed. The arguments against D&X are directed towards queasy stomachs and superstitions, and represent a deliberate distortion of the practice for political ends.

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http://wsws.org/articles/2003/oct2003/abor-o24.shtml