#abortion laws

[destielmemenews]

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[onlyhereforangst]

fuck this handmaids tale country.

[kp777]

By AJ McDougall

Yahoo News

April 26, 2023

A Texas woman testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the subject of the harm of abortion bans tore into her senators on Wednesday, saying she nearly died as “a direct result” of the policies Ted Cruz and John Cornyn support.

Amanda Zurawski, one of five women suing the state of Texas for denying them abortions after medical complications arose in their pregnancies, began by noting that neither Cruz nor Cornyn was present in the room.

“But I would like for them to know that what happened to me… it’s a direct result of the policies that they support,” she said. “I nearly died on their watch. And furthermore, as a result of what happened to me, I may have been robbed of the opportunity to have children in the future.”

Despite that, Zurawski continued, she considered herself “lucky,” as she had a supportive partner and a job “that allowed me to grieve for three days as I waited to almost die.”

She raised the specter of the “many” women who need life-saving abortions but don’t have the same support system. “What about them?” she asked.

Read more and watch video clip.

[a-young-doctors-journey]

You cannot ban abortion. You can only ban safe abortion.

[onlytiktoks]

[unsympatheticchemprof]

[guilty-feminist]

[mov24]

[lil-redrover]

[eddiesblklvr]

i’m scared and angry for my daughter, who’s very young right now but might not be able to choose whether or not she wants to have a baby when she’s older.

i’m scared and angry for my sisters, who are young teens and are starting to develop into young women. something could happen to them or they might make an adult decision and might not be able to choose whether or not they want to have a baby.

i’m scared and angry for myself, because i might not be able to choose whether or not i want more kids in the future.

i’m scared and angry for anyone else with a uterus who may not want kids or has complications during pregnancy and can’t abort because of laws made by people who refuse to use their brains.

[destielmemenews]

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[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Grand jury declines to indict Ohio woman who miscarried of abusing a corpse | The Washington Post

By Kim Bellware

An Ohio grand jury has declined to indict Brittany Watts, the 34-year-old woman charged with abusing a corpse after experiencing a miscarriage at home in a case that drew national attention to the ways women may be criminalized for their pregnancy outcomes in a post-Dobbs landscape.

The Trumbull County grand jury that had been investigating Watts’s case for a month on Thursday returned what’s known as a “no bill” for felony abuse of a corpse charges; as a result, charges against Watts will be immediately dismissed.

Trumbull County prosecutor Dennis Watkins said through a spokesperson that he plans to address the grand jury’s decision within the next day. Watkins was widely criticized for pursuing the case against Watts and was last month urged by medical and legal professionals to drop the case.

Neither Watts nor her lawyer, Traci Timko, responded to request for comment Thursday.

In a statement, Yveka Pierre, senior counsel at If/When/How, a group of reproductive rights lawyers that provided legal support in Watts’s case, said she was relieved to see the end of a “dehumanizing” case against Watts.

“Brittany should have been able to focus on taking care of herself after her pregnancy loss. She should have been able to process, and grieve with her family and community” Pierre said. “Instead, she was arrested and charged with a felony.”

Ohio Physicians for Reproductive Rights (OPRR), among the chief professional groups to condemn Watts’s charges, in a statement hailed the grand jury’s decision as a “firm step against the dangerous trend of criminalizing reproductive outcomes.”

Lauren Beene, a doctor and co-founder of OPRR, told The Washington Post Thursday that charging pregnant people like Watts who are in the midst of life-threatening complications and devastating pregnancy losses can have a chilling effect on health care; women may not be able to get the care they need or be afraid to seek out the care they need, leading to negative outcomes like higher maternal mortality.

Watts’s case also drew attention to Ohio’s existing Targeted Restrictions on Abortion Providers (TRAP) laws. Despite Ohio voters last year approving Issue 1, a law enshrining the right to abortion in Ohio’s constitution, there are about 30 TRAP laws on the books that have not been repealed and that interfere with reproductive care, Beene said.

“If people are miscarrying like Watts was and the fetus still has a heartbeat but it’s a nonviable fetus, Issue 1 should protect her,” Beene said. “But without taking down the TRAP laws, like the fetal heartbeat law, health care institutions may be afraid to provide the care and may not understand what they can and can’t do.”

The Post previously reconstructed Watts’s days leading up to her miscarriage, drawing on medical records, call recordings and interviews with Watts and her lawyer.

Watts miscarried at home last September after four days in and out of the hospital where she had been told her nearly 22-week pregnancy was not viable. There was still detectable fetal cardiac activity, which complicated how quickly a decision could be made to induce Watts, despite doctors indicating she was at increasing risk of death. Abortion in Ohio remains legal up to 22 weeks.

At home, Watts delivered a roughly 15-ounce fetus over the toilet. When blood, stool and tissue from the delivery clogged the toilet, Watts removed what she believed was blocking the flow and placed the contents in a bucket outdoors, records show. When she returned to the hospital after her delivery, a nurse who inquired about the fetus later reported Watts to police.

Police eventually removed Watts’s toilet and found the fetus lodged in the pipes. Timko, Watts’s attorney, said her client had no criminal record and was being “demonized for something that goes on every day,” but a municipal judge found there was evidence to bind Watts’s case over for a grand jury investigation.

A coroner’s report later confirmed the fetus died in utero and was not injured by Watts’s actions. Neither prosecutors nor health care workers who treated Watts disputed that her pregnancy loss was natural.

The decision to charge Watts sparked concerns among women’s health advocates and others that the risk of being criminalized for pregnancy outcomes was growing. On Thursday before the grand jury announcement, a rally in support of Watts had been scheduled in the Warren Courthouse Square. A fundraiser for Watts that began in December has raised more than $230,000.

[missegyptiana]

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[unsympatheticchemprof]

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