LIVE BIRTH ABORTION

Live-Birth Abortions
The Next Step After Partial-Birth Abortion
By Catherina Hurlburt
July 2000

"My intent in every abortion I have ever done is to kill the fetus and terminate the pregnancy." —Leroy Carhart, Nebraska abortionist.¹

Leroy Carhart was the defendant in this year’s controversial U.S. Supreme Court decision, Stenberg v. Carhart, regarding Nebraska’s partial-birth abortion ban. Sadly, the Court narrowly decided in Carhart’s favor. With a 5-4 vote, it condoned the inhumane procedure in which the abortionist allows the entire baby to be born except for the head. He then punctures the skull and extracts the brain before discarding her. Thus, we beg the question: At what point, legally, does a baby have protection as a person?

The Dilemma
Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992) used the notion of "viability," the point at which the child may survive outside the mother’s womb, as the standard for legal protection. This causes confusion over whether a baby born alive but not considered "viable" deserves protection under the law. Of course, medical advancement has pushed back the point of viability even in the eight years since Casey.

With the Carhart decision, the Court further muddied the waters by putting its stamp of approval on the aborting of partially born, not just unborn, babies. "If such ideas go unchecked," said Rep. Charles Canady (R-Florida), "the end result will be legal and moral confusion as to the status of completely born infants who were marked for abortion or are on the outskirts of viability [emphasis in original]."² If the baby is simply a sum of body parts, what difference is there, really, between killing a child whose head remains somewhat within her mother’s body and killing a child who has completely exited her mother’s body? Thus, the procedure known as "live-birth abortion" comes into play.

The Procedure
A live-birth abortion involves three basic steps. First, the physician opens the cervix—the neck of the uterus that usually remains tightly closed until the time of delivery—using either Cytotec or laminaria (little match-like sticks composed of seaweed). Cytotec is the usual choice. He inserts one 200-microgram pill or two 100-microgram pills in or near the cervix, irritating it and causing it to open.

Second, after the cervix opens, the small baby—usually in its second trimester—literally drops out of the womb. Sometimes, the baby dies in the process. However, many are born alive—thus the name, "live-birth" abortion. In this case, the third step is letting the baby die. A nurse may hold the baby ("comfort care") or leave her to die alone. In some cases, hospital workers have suffocated, drowned or beaten the babies to death.

Babies may also be born alive in incomplete, or "botched," abortions. The confusing Casey decision implies that babies born alive are not legally protected persons if they are not viable. Interestingly, when so-called "wanted" babies are born prematurely, physicians make heroic efforts to save them and optimize their physical condition. However, if a born-alive child is marked for death—the target of abortion—her life has no value, by the Stenberg and Casey standards. In a modern civilization, this thinking is barbaric, to say the least, and unconstitutional, to be sure.

Other Ethical Problems
The phenomenon of infants born alive and left to die is not limited to a few isolated incidents. "The procedure, in which physicians induce premature labor, has been an option for decades at hospitals around the country," reported the Chicago Tribune.³ Jill Stanek, a nurse at Christ Hospital in suburban Chicago, came forward in 1999 to reveal the hospital’s routine infanticide. CWA of Illinois State Director Karen Hayes helped publicize the atrocity and convinced the Illinois Attorney General to investigate the hospital. Christ Hospital officials claimed doctors only used the procedure when the child had life-threatening defects. However, Jill witnessed doctors performing the procedure on babies with Down syndrome and spina bifida. The procedure outraged former U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop: "Abortion for spina bifida is not indicated unless one is committed to a practice of eugenics."⁴

Further, an in-house memo from Christ Hospital’s genetics program to the Obstetrics Department sought notification of all still births, premature deaths and abortions.⁵ In addition, a brochure from Advocate Health Care, Christ Hospital’s parent company, announced the hospital now offers stem-cell transplants.⁶ Doubtless, with the tide in stem-cell research, the ethical and moral compromises over the lives of infants slated for abortion may surge.

Legal Protection
It truly is a sad day in our history when lawmakers must jump through hoops to establish legally what is so obvious medically and morally: Infants possess full personhood, equally deserving legal protection. Rep. Canady introduced the "Born-Alive Infants Protection Act of 2000," H.R. 4292, to do just that. It would establish, "for purposes of federal law, an infant who is completely expelled or extracted from her mother and who is alive, is indeed a person under the law."

In an age of vague standards and disrespect for human life, punctuated by contentious court decisions, this legislation is a significant step toward recognizing the value of all human life.

End Notes

1.       Carhart v. Stenberg, U.S. District Court for the District of Nebraska, 14 August 1997.

2.       Charles T. Canady press release, 17 July 2000.

3.       Jeremy Manier, "Rare Abortions by Induced Labor Probed by State," Chicago Tribune, 29 September 1999.

4.       Letter from C. Everett Koop to Advocate Health Care, Christ Hospital’s parent company, 15 September 1999.

5.       Dan Zanoza, "Christ Hospital Memo Links Facility with Fetal Research," City News, Inc., 8 October 1999.

6.       Ibid.