Late-Term Abortions
Democrat Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey claims that she signed a law authorizing abortions up till birth so that women who “receive a devastating diagnosis late in their pregnancy” can “get the care that they need.”
IN FACT, the prior law already permitted such abortions, while the new law sanctions completely elective abortions on humans who have developed enough to suckle, hear sounds, make coordinated limb movements, and feel pain. Here are the specifics:
- Prior to the new act signed by Healy, Massachusetts law permitted elective abortions before 24 weeks and later abortions up till birth if “necessary” for the “physical or mental health” of the “patient” or due to a “grave fetal diagnosis.”
- The “mental health” provision of the prior law provided considerable latitude to perform abortions up till birth because “mental health” can be interpreted to mean anything from the “stigma of unwed motherhood,” to the work of “child care,” or the “distress” of having an “unwanted child.”
- The new Massachusetts law scraps the maternal health and fetal diagnosis provisions and authorizes abortions from 24 weeks up till birth “based upon the professional judgment of the physician” that performs the abortion.
- Healey alleges that the law will ensure “healthcare decisions” are “made between women and families and their doctors,” but the law actually deletes the “health” provision of the prior law and invokes the “judgment” of any abortionist — not a woman’s personal physician, obstetrician, or psychiatrist.
- Contrary to media outlets and politicians who have declared without evidence that late-term abortions are mostly or only done for medical reasons, late-term abortionist Martin Haskell admitted, “I’ll be quite frank: most of my abortions are elective in that 20–24 week range.”
- Likewise, Renee Chelian, president of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers said of late-term abortions, “The spin out of Washington was that it was only done for medical necessity, even though we knew it wasn’t so.”
- Likewise, two doctors at a New Jersey abortion clinic stated that their facility was performing roughly 3,000 late-term abortions per year, “most” of which were “elective, not medical.”
- Likewise, Ron Fitzsimmons, executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, stated that he “lied through” his “teeth” about the reasons for late-term abortions because he was afraid that the truth would erode public support for abortion. Disowning his previous statements, he admitted that such abortions are “primarily done on healthy women and healthy fetuses.”
- Per the latest comprehensive data from a scholarly journal, “more than 15,000” abortions are performed each year in the U.S. “at 21 weeks or later.”
- Facts from scientific publications show that by 21 weeks of development, humans suckle, sleep, wake and hear sounds, make coordinated limb movements, exhibit conscious motor planning, and feel pain.
- Per the Encyclopedia of Human Biology, “electrical activity of the nervous system is discernible” at 12 weeks, and “attempts to suckle have been seen in utero and in aborted fetuses of 3 months.”
- Per the scientific journal PLoS ONE, humans exhibit conscious “motor planning” and “social behavior” by 12 weeks of gestation.
- Per the medical textbook Before We Are Born: Essentials of Embryology and Birth Defects, “limb movements” become “coordinated” by 14 weeks.
- Per the medical journal Fetal Diagnosis and Therapy, “a physiological fetal reaction to painful stimuli” occurs by 14 to 22 weeks.
- Per the New England Journal of Medicine, pain sensory receptors spread to “all cutaneous [skin] and mucous surfaces” by 18 weeks, and the cerebral cortex has the same number of nerve cells as a full-grown adult.
- Per the American Medical Association Complete Medical Encyclopedia, “At 20 weeks, the “fetus now sleeps and wakes and hears sounds.”
- The most common type of late-term abortion procedure is dismemberment in which the “fetal limbs are pulled off the body in utero, sometimes while the fetus is still alive.”
- The procedure used for dismemberment abortions is illegal throughout the nation for slaughtering livestock because federal humane law requires that all livestock be killed in a manner that renders them immediately unconscious.
- The procedure used for dismemberment abortions is illegal throughout the nation for killing “living non-human mammals, birds, reptiles, or amphibians” because the Preventing Animal Cruelty and Torture Act bans purposely crushing or mutilating such animals.
