Scientific America has some bad news about Zika in Puerto Rico:
“Based on the limited available information on the risk of microcephaly, we estimate between 100 to 270 cases of microcephaly might occur” between mid-2016 and mid-2017, said Dr. Margaret Honein, chief of the birth defects branch at the CDC, who was one of several authors of the study published August 19 in JAMA Pediatrics.
Politico’s Jennifer Haberkorn looks at how Zika could change the discssion on abortion:
Pregnant women with the Zika virus are at risk of giving birth to babies with devastating brain damage, which can be detected only around 18 to 20 weeks — and often much later than that. …
An Aug. 5 Harvard University-STAT poll found only 23 percent of American adults believe a woman should have access to abortion after 24 weeks of pregnancy. But that opposition softened notably when the question was framed in terms of Zika.
“Maybe the Zika epidemic and its implications for pregnant women will help us shine a light on the exactly tragic situation in which you have these abortions,” said Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.), co-chairman of the House Pro-Choice Caucus.
Life and decision making gets a lot simpler when we assume that women are capable moral agents making their own decisions about their own health and autonomy. But our political process does not allow for that. The Politico article brings up the rubella epidemic that led to abortion being discussed in public as “respectable” discussion as it was seen as a health procedure instead of an non-punishment for the sluts (you know those girls) for having sex.
Dr. Jen Grunter writes about how she came to perform abortions during later stages of pregnancies. Her patients needed help and she helped them.
I didn’t set out to do post 20 week abortions, I just kind of ended up doing them because with each turn in medical school and residency it seemed no one else was….
However, as the doctor it was left to me to explain why we thought it best they not look. All the things no one knows how to do or wants to do are left to the doctor. Do you show a woman that her baby really is a cyclops? I know she knows because she told you between sobs when she called, or rather her husband did because she was crying so hard she couldn’t speak anymore. But is that the image I should lock in her brain for the rest of her life or the five toes? You just do the best you can. I like to think that my patients knew that….
.A law was passed to prevent abortions at KU medical center unless the life of the woman was in jeopardy… Want state funding, stop abortions. …
Guess who gets to decide if a woman passes the Kansas state government’s test for being sick enough to die from her pregnancy? Not the cardiologist who calls at 3 a.m. in a panic or the nephrologist who breathlessly corners you in the hallway or the intensivist who tracks you down on your vacation. Not any of the people who manage the illness trying to kill the pregnant woman. Not me either, but the politician who crafted the mayhem via a three-way phone call set up by the hospital attorney. And yes he was shocked beyond belief that such a scenario existed….
What is it like doing late abortions? It’s mostly very sad because no one is there because they are happy. A wanted pregnancy causing serious physical harm, well, no one is happy they are sick or that they have to terminate their wanted pregnancy to live. I know these women were happy they met me and some even returned to be my patient. That always meant a lot. “You saved my life, how could I go to someone else?” What about a wanted pregnancy with severe malformations? No joy there either.
Immanentize
Great, heartbreaking, post. Thanks Richard
Gindy51
The latest research is even more harrowing. A child can be born looking normal on the ultrasounds but start to have brain atrophy 6 months after birth. Also it affects the adult brains of mice in the areas of memory and learning. This shit is NASTY to the 100th degree.
Mary G
Andrew Sullivan had a series of posts about families who had or considered late term abortions.
It was heartbreaking – babies with severe defects who would live only a short time in excruciating pain. The decisions were agonizing. I get so angry at the Republicans who act like women just sit around twiddling their thumbs for six months and then decided to get rid of a perfectly healthy fetus on a whim.
Another thing I have been thinking about since Trump’s contretemps about punishment for women who seek abortions. Why do “pro-lifers” insist the doctors are the only ones at fault and that of course the woman isn’t? Pretty insulting to deny the woman’s agency.
MomSense
@Gindy51:
Oh my god that is horrible.
Kay
If people go back and read Roe they’ll see that the justices really grappled with how difficult abortion is- they’re aware that they’re attempting to tier all of these issues- agency of the mother, medical issues and advice, what are really shifting rights of the fetus as it comes closer to term, the power of the state and the duty the state has to all the various actors…
They ended up in the same place I did and I have yet to see anyone else come up with a better analysis. Why do the mother and her physician have to have agency and decision-making that exceed or trump other interests? Because pregnancy is unique and no one else is better situated than the mother and her physician. They may not be perfect. They may make poor decisions or decisions people disagree with. But no one else is better situated.
Baud
@Mary G: It’s politically necessary. After they’ve successfully banned abortions, they’ll give the woman agency once the illegal abortions begin.
Gindy51
@MomSense: Mothers who are bit by Zika carrying mosquitoes later in their pregnancies are at risk for this. All human who are bit by them maybe at risk for the latter consequences over time. Horrific indeed.
Kay
@Mary G:
If you read the state laws restricting abortion the women are often missing. It’s almost eerie. She disappears. It’s one of the reasons I won’t trust them with the decision.
No where else in state law does this happen. No where else does an actor just disappear.
satby
They aren’t “pro-life”. They’re pro-forced birth. They’re completely smug in their insistence that abortion is always for frivolous reasons.
greennotGreen
Because we have a serious genetic disease in my family, I see up close what having a sick child does to a family’s hopes and dreams. The idea that politicians think they are in a position to determine whether or not a woman continues a pregnancy makes me livid, even though I also know there are women who would abuse it.
And one of the most anger-producing aspects is that abortion prohibitions are only for the poor. Rich women have always had access to safe abortions, whether it involved being able to pay the fee of a competent physician willing to break the law or to be able to combine a medical procedure with a European vacation.
HRA
This reminds me of the Thalidomide crisis of the 1960s when abortion was illegal in the US. I was pregnant with my third child. It took a few days to learn all the information about it completely. We did not have the instant access to it like we have today.
When the news finally addressed it fully writing about the pill and it’s possible consequences, I knew I was safe for only taking calcium pills during the pregnancy. Others were not safe. There was a big story about a woman from one of the states out west going to Japan for an abortion. Everyone could not afford it.
Photos of children being born to mothers who did use thalidomide began to appear in the newspapers. Even though I was safe from the possibility, I felt a great sadness for the children and their parents.
Over 20 years later when I was working in the campus of the university, I saw a student who I knew at once was a thalidomide baby with not fully developed arms. Only after I put some distance between us could I allow myself to revisit the sadness of the past and instead re[lace it with giving him the well deserved pride for following his dream of higher education.
This personal experience of the 1960s was the start of my support for legal abortion. .
Iowa Old Lady
@Mary G: I heard some fool trying to clean up after Trump by saying that women weren’t the guilty party in abortion. They were victims. Poor little dears don’t know what they’re doing.
liberal
IIRC that fucking moral monster Henry Hyde lectured a witness during a committee meeting who had a late term abortion because her baby had anencephaly.
Lurker Extraordinaire
Oh, Richard, because it’s Puerto Rico, very few, and CERTAINLY not Congress, will care. It’s a colony, nothing more.
Hell, politicians can barely care when it’s happening in actual states, let alone U.S. possessions.
I have a friend whose first child was born with a horrific brain deformity. She was going to put the baby up for adoption before they found out the child would not live long enough after birth. She chose to carry out the pregnancy, which is fine, that was her choice, but this same woman (who is wonderful otherwise) is a huge Glenn Beck fan and anti-abortion. Why she feels that other women should be forced to go through what she did, I will never understand. I will not tell another grown woman what to do in that situation. Abortion is between a woman and her doctor. Period. Why is it always “choice for me, but not for thee”? Can’t stand it. That’s why websites like “My Abortion Is The Only Moral Abortion” piss me off so much.
sherparick
@satby: So right. Between the Republican Party, the Village Media, and their Corporate paymasters who keep them on the leash, it is hard to believe such a depraved group of people running the country. There was no way that a public health crisis like Zika, or Ebola, would not have gotten full and immediate funding time of New Deal to the time of Reagan. But now, it has to be weaponized to attack one’s political enemies.
tokyo expat
My first baby was diagnosed anencephaly. If I’m a one issue voter, this is it. I will not ever vote for a Republican after all they have done to try to ban abortion. It is devastating to a mother to go to an ultrasound and see the doctor’s face grow concerned and tell you to come back next week, maybe it’s the position. So you go back next week and give blood and then sit through another exam where a second doctor is called in and they gently tell you that the baby has no brain and that they lay out the choices for you.
My husband and I chose to terminate. I have never regretted the decision. At the time I was a mess emotionally. I could not imagine carrying the baby to term. I’m also grateful that the whole experience took place in Japan.
Six months later I was pregnant with my oldest son, who is 19, doing awesome in university, and going to vote for HC for his first vote (if I can figure out to get him registered).
I really really despise these anti-abortion people, who always make it out as if abortion is the birth control of choice. There are many devastating reasons behind terminating a pregnancy, but it is a choice and no matter the reason it’s the woman’s to make.
My deepest thanks and admiration to Dr. Jen Grunter because it’s a heartbreaking job and puts a target on your back in the US.
JMG
I am firmly of the opinion that Obama should’ve gone on national TV and said that although Congress had not appropriated zika money requested, he was spending it anyway. Let them impeach him for fighting a plague. Talk about optics! As Sen. William “Alfalfa Bill” Murray (D-N. Dakota) is alleged to have told FDR, “what’s the Constitution among friends?”
daveNYC
@Gindy51: I can’t imagine that zika doesn’t cause problems for children and infants too. Shit is one nasty disease.
WereBear
I used to think there were “oppression rationales” like someone had a scheme to make money or they had a genuine, if misguided, reason for pushing this kind of agenda.
But now I have come around to think that no: they just like inflicting human suffering.
Look at the Koch Brothers, still going full steam with their Bircher fantasies even though there are no Communists that offer any kind of menace. Look at the Evangelicals, pivoting to be against birth control, too, even though that radically lowers abortion rates. Republicans claim they love saving money, but refuse to do any kind of prevention which would result in far less government spending, from making sure bridges don’t fall down to public health measures.
Their goal must be human suffering. That is the only goal they consistently meet.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
Great post, Richard. And great comments.
I’d like to highlight this:
So much of political life would be better if that weren’t the case. One could also replace “women” with “everyone other than yourself” (immigrants, people of other cultures and other religions, the young, the old, etc.), also too.
None of us have a monopoly on virtue. None of us live the lives of other people and have gone through exactly what they have gone though. Maybe people actually can usually make the best choices for themselves on average (or at least better choices than some politician who knows nothing about them), especially when they have help available. It’s dangerous hubris to try to always force people to have children simply because a woman is pregnant.
Cheers,
Scott.
Aleta
@tokyo expat: well said
Lurker Extraordinaire
@tokyo expat: I am so sorry you and your husband had to go through that. :-(
Snarki, child of Loki
I, for one, welcome the availability of post-natal abortions for RWNJ microcephalics. If it had been available 30 years ago, the world would be a much better place.
OzarkHillbilly
@satby:
I have this fantasy of going to an abortion clinic and asking all the protesters how much money they are willing to give in a legally binding pledge to a mother who forgoes an abortion, and are they willing to make it a monthly donation until the child is 18 or if it is born disabled for it’s entire life. And get it all on video. I think we’d all find out real quick just exactly how much they truly value all these unborn children.
Maybe some day I will.
ET
@Lurker Extraordinaire: So the woman was going to put the baby up for adoption after a problem was found but before the found out it wouldn’t live long after birth? Please tell me I am reading that wrong. Because if I read that right I suspect she isn’t “wonderful otherwise.”
Barbara
@tokyo expat: I had a similar experience and for me, at least, it goes well beyond abortion per se, and puts in stark relief the astonishing magnitude of cruelty and dishonesty it takes to exploit the tragedy of second term terminations. We aren’t talking a difference of opinion, the information is there for anyone to find, they are lying about, humiliating, and hurting suffering people in order to achieve a political goal. It’s what Republican politics has become — everything from laws on voter ID to the use of bathrooms by transgendered people — lying about the facts and then exploiting vulnerable people to win the political point.
Barbara
@ET: She might not have been in a position to raise a special needs child. From my perspective, it is more compassionate to admit that and surrender the child to someone who could provide necessary care. I watched my cousin’s life and marriage fall apart trying to care for a severely afflicted child. Even though he died young, at six years old, and she actually had more support than many people, it overwhelmed her and her family.
Miss Bianca
This is the thing that infuriates me about all the abortion discussions. This, right here. No one lets a pregnancy get to the point of 24 weeks or beyond and then tries to terminate unless there’s some serious problem going on. But women are NOT considered fully autonomous agents in their own medical/health/reproductive choices in this country. And so we get this type of fuckstickery.
I mentioned in a thread a few days back that NARAL came out against Amendment 69 in Colorado, the Colorado Care Amendment, precisely over the issue of whether or not abortion services would be covered. Because there’s a 1984 statute that prohibits “public funding of abortions”. So, women would either have to pay for AB services out of their own pockets, or carry supplemental insurance that would pay for it – and as the Colorado NARAL director pointed out, “that basically means you have to plan for abortion services. But the point is that no one *plans* to get an abortion.”
The pro-69 people are arguing that if 69 passes, the newer law supercedes the old. Lawyers on both sides are addressing the issue. But this WOULDN’T BE AN ISSUE if the gorram White Wing in this country hadn’t decided to MAKE abortion an issue, and gin up opposition to it.
Sometimes I just hate people.
Miss Bianca
@greennotGreen:
I’m sorry, but “abuse” what? The right to abortion? Abortion *is* a right. The point is that no one, in a world that really values women’s autonomy as fully functional human beings, gets to make the decision about whether or not a woman gives birth but THE WOMAN. Period. Full stop. Doesn’t matter if she doesn’t want to be pregnant any more because of fetal birth defects or whether she JUST DOESN’T WANT TO BE PREGNANT, PERIOD.
“Abuse”, my ass.
ding
@satby: forced birthers – a telling label
CONGRATULATIONS!
@greennotGreen: Oh really? Fuck you. Seriously. You don’t get to make that call.
If a woman wants to have an abortion every week, that’s her issue and you don’t get to have a say in it, or even have an opinion about it. That’s between her and her doctor. You get to fuck right off.
greennotGreen
@Miss Bianca: Perhaps I should have given an example. I know of two women who had five abortions each because they couldn’t be bothered to use birth control consistently. One of those women since had her one child removed from the home by Child Protective Services. Both of them were financially able to have had their tubes tied, but they were simply irresponsible. Do I think that either of them should have been forced to give birth? No! But I do think that such casual, repeated use of a medical procedure instead of birth control is a form of abuse…of the woman’s body, if nothing else.
greennotGreen
@CONGRATULATIONS!: I don’t have a say in it, although I may have an opinion.
For example, I’m allergic to clams. Now, I happen to really like clam chowder which I have now not eaten for decades. What if I just kept eating clam chowder and using an expensive Epi-pen every time I had a reaction, with the occasional trip to the emergency room? You wouldn’t think that to be stupid and wasteful? To me, same thing with repeatedly relying on abortion instead of birth control. I am not trying to damn women who’ve had multiple abortions, but I am critical of these two women I know personally who were careless and who had other choices.
slag
@Miss Bianca: My favorite aspect of this whole debate is the basic premise that we can’t trust a woman enough to let her make the best decisions for a 9-month pregnancy, but we can trust her with 18 years of a human’s life.
The Other Chuck
@WereBear: Yep. These guys have shown they will even spend a good chunk of their money if it’ll inflict more suffering than making that money. They’re just usually inclined to the latter is all.
The Other Chuck
@slag: Well, their argument would be that she can’t terminate a 17-year-old either. It’s not like they care if her kid actually does anything other than live, or at worst die in a way they approve.
amygdala
In addition to it becoming clearer that infection later in pregnancy can have major consequences, there’s now evidence that at least some infected people can transmit the infection for months. Right now, it still looks like mosquitoes are the major mode of transmission, but the STI angle may wind up being a real game-changer. In temperate zones, transmission drops by late summer, as the mosquitoes go away for the winter, but not so if sexual transmission is at all efficient.
With the ongoing woes in Louisiana, there’s concern that it may spread rapidly across the Gulf Coast. Especially if rising temperatures mean mosquito season lasts longer than it did a decade or more ago.
Having said that, West Nile, another mosquito-borne infection stumped the epidemiologists year by year sometimes.
greennotGreen
@slag: I think the idea is for a woman to carry a healthy white baby to term and give it up for adoption. Other color babies or those that may be imperfect are of less concern, but it’s bad form to state it.
The Other Chuck
@Kay:
Also worth noting that ultimately the decision wasn’t even close. And four of the justices were Nixon appointees (not that Nixon’s domestic record can be so easily nailed down)
Miss Bianca
@greennotGreen: and yet…it’s their prerogative to use abortion as a form of birth control, if they choose to do so. A woman’s right to choose also includes…making choices we don’t necessarily approve of. Maddening, ain’t it?
slag
@greennotGreen: Well, then they’re going to have to start legislating that too.
Barbara
@greennotGreen: The premise for any statement that women are “abusing” abortion is that abortion is bad or wrong, kind of like abusing sick leave by calling in occasionally when in reality you are taking advantage of a One Day Sale at Macy’s, or even something more important, like attending a custody hearing. Even President Obama adheres to this line of thinking and it is grating. The person a woman risks hurting the most when she has multiple abortions is herself — her future fertility, should she wish it, her risk of having an infection, etc. You see, for the same reason a woman gets to decide to have an abortion she also gets to apply her value system to determine what it means to her. So Muslims think drinking alcohol and eating pork is evil. I don’t. I am not wrong and they are not wrong. We have different beliefs about the subject.
greennotGreen
@Miss Bianca: Yes, I agree, it is their prerogative. I never said it wasn’t.
Miss Bianca
@greennotGreen: And as for your clam chowder analogy, well…what do I care how you choose to deal with your medical issues? Seriously. That’s between you and your doctor. For all I know, people are getting you drunk and *forcing* you to eat it.
slag
@The Other Chuck: Don’t worry, they’ll still care enough to judge from afar. And then, when the kid becomes a drag on the state, they’ll get to make more lives miserable. And then judge them for their misery.
Barbara
@greennotGreen: So you clarified a bit. Let me respond. I don’t know your friends so I will simply say: a lot of people find the subject of intentionality in their life to be a difficult one, especially when it comes to having sex. On the other hand, you seem to be fairly confident that your acquaintances — both single (presumably) and both in prime child bearing age — would find it easy to get their tubes tied, which is a form of permanent sterilization. First, they might actually want to have kids in the future, so tying their tubes would be suboptimal. Second, many women find it extremely difficult to find a doctor to perform this procedure unless they are over the age of 35 and already have two or more children, and are preferably married or divorced. Third, your friends might have been advised to avoid other types of contraception for health reasons (or might be fearful on their own for valid or invalid reasons), high blood pressure, perhaps. But finding doctors to provide IUDs can also be difficult, and IUDs have a much higher upfront cost. Yeah, for me serial abortion would be very negative, but maybe you don’t actually know their circumstances like you think you do.
greennotGreen
@Miss Bianca: How we choose to deal with our medical issues impacts all of us. Do people have a right to eat poorly and not exercise and maybe drink too much? Sure. But it runs up medical expenses for everyone, and it’s not an infinite pot of money (or hospital beds or staff.) It would be better for society as a whole if we all ate well and exercised and practiced moderation.
I don’t think defending the right of people to make bad decisions and approving of those bad decisions is the same thing.
And may I repeat, I very strongly support abortion rights.
greennotGreen
@Barbara: Actually, I do know their circumstances. One of them already had a child and was at the time of abortions 2-5 (or maybe it was 3-5) an IV drug abuser. So, in her case, intentionality was definitely an issue, but she came from money and certainly had access to sterilization. In the second case, the woman did eventually have children…because her husband threatened to leave her if she had another abortion. (I hope her kids never find that out.)
Again, I defend their rights to have made those decisions; I just think they could have made better ones.
Miss Bianca
@greennotGreen: The point, for me, is this: Unless you are actually going to physically police people’s decisions – round them up and monitor their food and drug intake, monitor and control their access to sex and exercise – you can’t enforce your ideas about what’s right for other people’s health and good for society in general simply by arguing that they are “right”, and more cost-effective for the health-care system. You can try to influence other people’s decisions, sure, but you can’t control them. And if you can’t control them, then honestly I don’t see the point in judging them.
ETA: Actually, I don’t see the point in judging them, period, but that’s just me.
The Other Chuck
@greennotGreen:
It’d be awful nice to not color the tone of the discourse with judgments about decisions that you would have been in no position to make, had you been in their shoes. Not trying to single you out or even that argument, I’m trying to say that these women were being judged enough already before they went and made decisions you don’t agree with.
tokyo expat
@Aleta: I look forward to the day it doesn’t need to be said.
@Lurker Extraordinaire: Thank you. But life moves on and I went on to give birth to 3 healthy boys. I regret that my first pregnancy wasn’t viable, but I don’t regret the decision to end the pregnancy.
@Barbara: It breaks my heart when I hear stories of women having to battle clinic protesters, as if they needed that garbage on top of the reason they are there. It also makes steam come out of my ears when they pass these stupid laws requiring doctors to lie to women and force them to have an ultrasound before they can have an abortion. The people who support these laws and pass them are horrible people.
Barbara
@greennotGreen: My point is that having money does not guarantee access to all forms of contraception. You may be underestimating how patronizing the medical system is to women trying to obtain sterilization services.
Miss Bianca
@Barbara: this is the word. Part of it is condescension – “oh, little lady, you just don’t know your own mind yet” – and part of it is that they are scared of getting sued. I remember a friend of mine who, in her 20s, was adamant that she didn’t want children, and went to her doctor and told him she wanted a tubal ligation. He basically said: “no doctor is going to perform this procedure on you right now, no matter how much you want it, because if you got it and changed your mind later, that might be grounds for a malpractice suit.”
Now, does it go without saying that this woman was white? If she had been a POC, it might have been a different matter altogether – raising the spectre of the forced sterilizations that many women underwent in the 20th century, most notably women admitted to psychiatric hospitals and other “undesirables”.
catclub
@JMG: Obama would never do that. 1) He taught Con Law
2) He knows about setting precedents that others who are not like him will take advantage of.
I am on Obama’s side here. It was Nixon who refused to spend appropriated money. It was wrong then. Same idea.
The Other Chuck
@catclub: You think Republicans are bound by anything like precedent? What’s even the point of the executive branch that won’t make executive decisions during an emergency?
I also say he should start making noises about how congress has abdicated its “advice and consent” responsibility when it comes to confirming justices. He’s never going to cross that line, but FFS he needs to take the fucking comity gloves off and point out what a constitutional failure the Republican congress is along with their political and moral failures.
Maybe walk onto the floor of congress, King Charles style. Then again, that didn’t end too well for my namesake…
CONGRATULATIONS!
@Miss Bianca: My wife and I, neither one, ever wanted kids. Still don’t. And I’m having the devil’s own time finding someone who will do a vasectomy on me, because I’ve never had kids.
I’m 50.
This is fucking ludicrous.
If I really wanted kids it’s not that hard to do!
Mnemosyne
@Miss Bianca:
I dunno, we all get judgy from time to time. We all make decisions about whether or not to continue a friendship or relationship with someone based on their actions. It’s only when we decide that our personal moral judgement should have the force of law that it becomes a problem.
I hate to say it, but since one of the women in question was an IV drug addict, those abortions were probably for the best, because that’s no kind of life to bring a child into.
Miss Bianca
@CONGRATULATIONS!: Will they do it if you pinky-swear *promise* that you’ll get some of your sperm frozen and stored in a sperm bank?
(only half-kidding, btw).
Lurker Extraordinaire
@ET: No, no- she was going to adopt the baby out UNTIL she found out about the baby’s deformity. Sorry if I wasn’t clear.
Lurker Extraordinaire
@Mnemosyne:
THIS.
rikyrah
You are a good poster, Mayhew. Bringing it down to the very human level. This was kind of raw.
Thanks.
Lurkypants
@CONGRATULATIONS!: Try Planned Parenthood.
Paul Begala's Pink Tie
Women who get abortions almost always know what they’re doing when they end pregnancies. I terminated a pregnancy (first trimester) because we had three children under age 5 and knew we couldn’t be the parents we wanted to be if spread any more thinly. I know people with more children, but their limitations and expectations aren’t the same as mine. I dare anyone to tell me that deciding against yet another child was somehow immoral.
Paul Begala's Pink Tie
@Paul Begala’s Pink Tie: and I know that’s not the same kind of decision as doing the most humane thing for an anencephalic or otherwise severely deformed fetus, but it still comes down to individual autonomy… and for me, family values.
As for the “abuse” argument, the benefit to women, children and families is so much greater when women control their own reproduction that a few cases of abortion-as-birth-control don’t bother me a bit.