Abortions

Women who have had three or more abortions before their first childbirth are  nearly three times as likely to deliver prematurely or to have a baby with low birthrate, Finnish researchers reported Thursday. Premature delivery is associated with a variety of adverse effects, including prolonged hospital stays and impaired development. The researchers could not show that the abortions caused the increased risk, however, conceding that it could be associated with the mothers' lifestyles.

Dr. Henry Morgentaler, 90, an abortion rights activist who helped overturn Canada's abortion law 25 years ago, died Wednesday at his Toronto home, according to Carolyn Egan, director and founding member of the Ontario Coalition of Abortion Clinics. The Polish-born Morgentaler emerged in 1967 as an advocate for a woman's right to have an abortion, at a time when attempting to induce one was a crime punishable by life in prison. Morgentaler later said his five-year stay in the Nazi concentration camps of Auschwitz and Dachau prepared him for his showdown with Canada's legal system, saying that in his mind, laws can be wrong.

Re "Activist born on a church doorstep," Column One, May 17 C. Roy McMillan shows up almost every day at the last abortion clinic in Mississippi. He taunts anyone entering the clinic. What we have is another self-righteous activist who harasses women already making a tough decision - a decision that is theirs and theirs alone. A decision based on what is best for everyone involved. A decision that he has no right to interfere with. McMillan doesn't realize that he is probably the best advertisement for the pro-choice movement.

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court refused Tuesday to allow Indiana to block Medicaid funding of Planned Parenthood clinics because they perform abortions. Without comment, the high court let stand decisions by a federal judge in Indiana and the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago that prevented the measure from taking effect. The 2011 law would have banned Medicaid funds from going to an organization such as Planned Parenthood whose work includes performing abortions. Judge Diane S. Sykes, writing for the 7th Circuit last year, said the state's "defunding law excludes Planned Parenthood from Medicaid for a reason unrelated to its fitness to provide medical services, violating its patients' statutory right to obtain medical care from the qualified provider of their choice.

Regarding "The Abortions of Last Resort," by Karen Tumulty (Jan. 7): I have long adhered to my belief that women have the right to decide what to do with their own bodies. That I still believe. However, I have been comfortable with my beliefs where I had no right to be--this I discovered while reading the descriptions of late-term abortions. When I had finished, my chest was tight and I felt so very sad. I was mourning, I guess, for the pain of all those women who have had to make the decision not to keep the beings that began to grow inside of them, for a society that fosters ignorance and poverty, and for children never born.

SEATTLE - A federal judge has struck down an Idaho law prohibiting abortions after 20 weeks, ruling that the so-called fetal pain law violates U.S. Supreme Court prohibitions against unduly impeding a woman's ability to seek an abortion before her fetus is able to live outside the womb. U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill in Boise declared the 2011 law -- similar to limits adopted in at least seven other states -- to be unconstitutional in a ruling that took the Idaho Legislature to task for acting against the advice of its own attorney general.

In a letter to affiliated physicians and staff, Hoag Hospital in Newport Beach has announced that elective abortions will no longer be performed at the hospital. The letter said the decision is based of the low number of procedures done annually at the hospital and was made following a review of clinical services performed at the facility. Hoag Chief Executive and President Robert Braithwaite said there is a direct correlation between quality of care and the number of procedures performed.

The North Dakota Senate on Friday passed a bill banning abortions when a fetal heartbeat is detected, which could be as early as six weeks of pregnancy. If signed by the governor, it would be the most restrictive abortion law in the nation. The vote comes about one week after Arkansas legislators overrode a governor's veto to become the first state to ban abortions involving fetuses 12 weeks or older. The North Dakota legislation is among a string of antiabortion bills that the state's lawmakers have been considering this session.

North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple has signed into law the most restrictive abortion laws in the nation, including one that bans abortions after the detection of a fetal heartbeat, which can come as soon as six weeks after conception. A second bill signed by the Republican governor bans abortions solely for the purpose of gender selection and genetic abnormalities. And another requires that any physician who performs abortions must have staff privileges at a nearby hospital. The three new laws -- and a previously approved resolution calling for a November referendum on a constitutional amendment that is designed to protect life at any stage of development -- places the state at the forefront of efforts to limit abortion rights.

North Dakota lawmakers on Friday approved a state referendum for this fall on a constitutional amendment that, if passed, would effectively block abortion by holding that life begins at conception. In a 57-35 vote, the House followed the Senate's action and approved the referendum that now goes before the voters on the November ballot. Groups backing abortion rights said they will fight the referendum and, if needed, in the courts as well. “It is too intrusive and has too many unintended consequences,” Tammi Kromenaker of the Red River Women's Clinic, the state's sole facility offering abortions, said in a telephone interview with the Los Angeles Times.

An Arkansas law that bans most abortions after 12 weeks of pregnancy was temporarily blocked by a federal judge on Friday. In a ruling from the bench, U.S. District Court Judge Susan Webber Wright in Little Rock granted a preliminary injunction preventing the Arkansas law from going into effect as scheduled, a member of the court staff said by telephone. It was scheduled to start Aug. 16. Wright held that allowing the law to go into effect would cause “irreparable harm” to the doctors who sought the injunction and their patients.

When Philadelphia doctor Kermit Gosnell was put on trial for murder, activists seized on the case as a symbol of all that is wrong with abortion in America, and used it to call for tighter restrictions and stepped-up oversight. But though Gosnell's behavior was deplorable, macabre and unquestionably illegal, it was aberrational, not symbolic. He has now been convicted, and he will be punished. This does not weaken the case for safe, legal and accessible abortion. Gosnell, a 72-year-old doctor who was neither an obstetrician nor a gynecologist (having failed to complete a residency in those specialties, according to a grand jury report)

In a letter to affiliated physicians and staff, Hoag Hospital in Newport Beach announced that elective abortions will no longer be performed at the hospital because of the low number of procedures done annually. The decision was based on a review of clinical services performed at the facility that began last fall. Hoag Chief Executive and President Robert Braithwaite said the hospital places a high value on the level of care it provides, and that there is a direct correlation between quality of care and the number of procedures performed.

LONDON -- Spurred by the preventable death of a pregnant woman, the Irish government unveiled a proposed law Wednesday spelling out when abortions can be performed to save the life of the mother, a controversial move in a country that still outlaws most terminations. Prime Minister Enda Kenny said the bill would merely clear up the confusion surrounding when emergency abortions are allowed. But critics accused the government of paving the way for easier access to abortion, which many in the heavily Roman Catholic country oppose.

After six weeks of testimony, a Philadelphia jury began deliberating the fate of a veteran doctor accused of four counts of murder while performing late-term abortions in his clinic that served poor women. The case, which has reignited passions over the thorny issues surrounding abortion rights, went to the jury of seven women and five men on Tuesday. Dr. Kermit Gosnell, 72, is charged with four counts of first-degree murder in connection with the deaths of four babies that the prosecution contends were delivered alive during late-term abortions, then killed when their spines were cut with surgical scissors.

Re "Abortion's darkest side," Opinion, April 16 Jonah Goldberg draws the conclusion that late-term abortion (and, in fact, any kind of abortion) is an issue of morality first and foremost. As Philadelphia abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell's clinic proves, women who are desperate to end a pregnancy will submit to dangerous, unsanitary conditions and disreputable practitioners. States that make abortion illegal or virtually impossible to obtain can expect to see many similar clinics and practitioners and many more deaths, both of early- and late-term fetuses and the women determined to abort them.

After six weeks of testimony, a Philadelphia jury began deliberating the fate of a veteran doctor accused of four counts of murder while performing late-term abortions in his clinic that served poor women. The case, which has reignited passions over the thorny issues surrounding abortion rights, went to the jury of seven women and five men on Tuesday. Dr. Kermit Gosnell, 72, is charged with four counts of first-degree murder in connection with the deaths of four babies that the prosecution contends were delivered alive during late-term abortions, then killed when their spines were cut with surgical scissors.

Abortion rights were back in the news Friday, even as President Barack Obama and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney stepped up their efforts to win the women's vote . Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.), who is facing a tough race to retain his seat in Congress, told reporters Thursday that he was opposed to abortion under any circumstances - and that thanks to medical progress, “you can't find one instance” when it might be necessary to perform an abortion to protect a woman's health.

If abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell is found guilty of homicide, he will be unique among murderers-for-hire: He set his fees based on weight. "The bigger the baby, the more he charged," a grand jury explained. It recommended he be charged with eight counts of murder - one patient, seven babies. Despite what amounted to a blackout at many media outlets until last week, you've probably now heard at least some of the details. According to the grand jury report, Gosnell's Philadelphia "clinic" was a filthy abattoir.