Killing in the Name Of

In November of last year, Nicaragua outlawed all abortions, even those deemed medically necessary. The Nicaraguan abortion ban was celebrated in "pro-life" circles, and supported by the Catholic and Evangelical churches.

The law has also killed at least 82 women since its institution. And it is just part of an international system of "pro-life" laws that are killing and maiming women, orphaning children, and turning ordinary citizens into criminals.

María de Jesús González was a practical woman. A very poor single mother, the 28-year-old's home was a shack on a mountain near the town of Ocotal in Nicaragua. She made the best of it. The shack was spotless, the children scrubbed. She earned money by washing clothes in the river and making and selling tortillas.

That nowast quite enough to feed her four young children and her elderly mother, so every few months González caught a bus to Managua, the capital, and slaved for a week washing and ironing clothes. The pay was three times better, about £2.60 a day, and by staying with two aunts she cut her costs. She would return to her hamlet with a little nest-egg in her purse. She bought herself one treat - a pair of red shoes - but she would leave them with her family in Managua, as they were no good on the mountain trails she had to go up to get home.

During a visit to Managua in February she felt unwell and visited a hospital. The news was devastating. She was pregnant - and it was ectopic, meaning the foetus was growing outside the womb and not viable. The longer González remained pregnant, the greater the risk of rupture, haemorrhaging and death.

What González did next was - when you understand what life in Nicaragua is like these days - utterly rational. She walked out of the hospital, past the obstetrics and gynaecological ward, past the clinics and pharmacies lining the avenues, packed her bag, kissed her aunts goodbye, and caught a bus back to her village. She summoned two neighbouring women - traditional healers - and requested that they terminate the pregnancy in her shack. Without anaesthetic or proper instruments it was more akin to mutilation than surgery, but González insisted. The haemhorraging was intense, and the agony can only be imagined. It was in vain. Maria died. "We heard there was a lot of blood, a lot of pain," says Esperanza Zeledon, 52, one of the Managua aunts.

González was not stupid and did not want to die. She knew her chance of surviving the butchery was small. But being a practical woman, she recognised it was her only chance, and took it. The story of why it was her only chance is an unfolding drama of religion, politics and power that has made Nicaragua a crucible in the global battle over abortion rights. This central American country has become the third country in the world, after Chile and El Salvador, to criminalise all abortions. It is a blanket ban. There are no exceptions for rape, incest, or life- or health-threatening pregnancies.

González was told at the hospital that any doctor who terminated her pregnancy would face two to three years in jail and she, for consenting, would face one to two years. "Nicaraguan doctors are now afraid of going to trial or jail and losing their licence," says Leonel Arguello, president of the Nicaraguan Society of General Medicine. "Many are thinking that instead of taking the risk, it is better to let a woman die."

Leaders of "pro-life" organization have two responses to the epidemic of abortion-related deaths that kills some 70,000 women every year: Ignore and deny.

Abortion has long been illegal in Nicaragua but there had been exceptions for "therapeutic" reasons if three doctors agreed there was a risk to the woman's life. Those exceptions were no longer necessary, said the Nicaraguan Pro-Life Association, because medical advances obviated the need to terminate pregnancies. "The conditions that justified therapeutic abortion now have medical solutions," says a spokesman.

That must come as a surprise to the family of one Jane Doe, who was refused an abortion at Nicaragua hospital. One doctor there says:

Here [at this hospital] we have had women who have died.... For example, [name withheld] came here and had an ultrasound. It was clear that she needed a therapeutic abortion. No one wanted to carry out the abortion because the fetus was still alive. The woman was here two days without treatment until she expulsed the fetus on her own. And by then she was already in septic shock and died five days later. That was in March 2007.

A recent report by the World Health Organization proved what pro-choicers have been saying all along: That outlawing abortion doesn't end the practice, it just makes it more dangerous; that abortion is no less common in countries where it is illegal than in countries where it is allowed; and that the most effective way to lower the abortion rate is through contraception access and comprehensive sexual health education.

Thirteen percent of pregnancy and childbirth-related deaths world-wide are caused by unsafe abortion. The vast majority of these deaths occur in places where abortion is illegal. Countless women are injured and maimed during clandestine procedures. Because illegal abortion means that women who terminate pregnancies are criminals, many women are hesitant to go to the hospital after botched procedures for fear that they will be reported to the authorities. Doctors -- who often face even higher penalties for performing abortions than the women who procure them -- regularly refuse to administer any treatment that might get them mixed up in the anti-abortion crusade, even if the treatment is legally permissible. And so, as one Nicaraguan doctor told Human Rights Watch, "since the law was signed, [public hospitals] don't treat any hemorrhaging, not even post-menopausal hemorrhaging."

As a result, women are dying of treatable conditions. María de Jesús González, for example, had an ectopic pregnancy, a condition where a fertilized egg implants itself anywhere other than the uterine lining (usually in the fallopian tube). Doctors, scared of abortion-related charges, turned her away. Under Nicaraguan law, they technically could have treated her -- but even the treatment they're allowed to give may be questionable, and may be further compromised if anti-choice religious forces have their way.

According to the accepted Catholic doctrine (and adopted by other conservative religious groups), life begins at the moment of conception (when the egg is fertilized) and "direct abortion" -- ending the life of that the fertilized egg, embryo or fetus -- is impermissible. In the case of ectopic pregnancy, there is no hope for the egg to ever develop into a viable pregnancy. The easiest and often safest way to end an ectopic pregnancy is to administer methotrexate, a drug which ends the pregnancy. If that is not an option, surgeons can go into the fallopian tube and remove the pregnancy directly. But under pro-life doctrine, that egg is still a life and cannot be directly terminated. And so the acceptable alternative is to remove the woman's entire fallopian tube (or her cervix or whatever other part of her body holds the fertilized egg). That compromises her future fertility and is a much more serious surgery than the other two options, but from the "pro-life" view it's kosher because the intent wasn't to kill the egg, even though that was a known side effect and even though the egg's implantation was what threatened the woman's life. Simply removing the egg without taking out the whole fallopian tube is tantamount to abortion. And abortion, they say, is murder.

Who can blame doctors in anti-choice countries for being confused and scared?

In the meantime, countries with the most "pro-life" laws have higher abortion rates than the Western European countries with the most liberal abortion laws in the world. A large part of the difference is contraception -- Eastern Europe has seen a 50 percent decrease in its abortion rate since contraception became more widely available post-Communism. And yet contraception is something else that mainstream anti-choice groups oppose.

Yes, you read that right: Mainstream "pro-life" organizations are opposed to contraception as well as abortion. They're just keeping quiet about it because they know it's an unpopular position, and they know it outs them as hypocrites who put ideology over human life. But the fact remains that none of the well-known and influential national anti-choice groups have come out in support of contraception access. None of them promote the very thing that has been proven, time and again, to lower the abortion rate.

What do they promote? Abstinence until marriage and embracing pregnancy and childbirth. (Apparently, no married woman has ever wanted an abortion or experienced pregnancy-related complications). Other than that, anti-choice groups offer no real alternative to women who don't want to be pregnant, or women who don't have a choice to say no to sex, or women whose pregnancies threaten their life or their health. They offer no solution to the problem that kills nearly 70,000 women every year, other than "don't have sex outside of marriage; only have sex if you're willing to give birth; and abortion is wrong, don't have one."

That isn't working. It has never worked.

When you combine lack of access to reproductive health care with stringent anti-abortion laws, women die. That is an undeniable fact, and it's one that "pro-life" leaders refuse to look in the face. When South Africa legalized abortion, it saw a 90 percent decrease in its abortion-related mortality rate. By contrast, abortion remains the second leading cause of death for women admitted to Ethiopian hospitals. Uganda, a country that the religious right has advertised as an abstinence education success story, has an abortion rate twice as high as the one in the United States. In Brazil, where abortion is illegal except in very limited cases, the abortion rate is significantly higher than the rate in the U.S., and some 288,700 women were hospitalized for abortion-related causes in one year. Illegal abortion is the cause of 25% of all maternal deaths in Latin America, 12% in Asia, and 13% in sub-Saharan Africa.

Abortion is a difficult topic, and well-intentioned people fall on all sides of the debate. Most people, pro-life or pro-choice or somewhere in between, are repulsed at the idea of women dying for "pro-life" ideology. Most people understand that education and contraception are the most effective ways to prevent abortion. But self-identified pro-life people need to recognize what their leaders promote and what their movement currently stands for.

So far, "pro-life" groups have been non-responsive to the dead bodies in their wake. They are, however, mobilizing around the world to spread policies like Nicaragua's far and wide. They are actively seeking to outlaw abortion in the United States, and in the meantime trying to limit access to it. Right now they're in Aurora, Illinois, opposing Planned Parenthood. They're also the base of a Republican party that regularly launches assaults at children and families. The right-wing opposition to children's health care is just the start; 100 percent of the country's worst legislators for children are "pro-life." The global gag rule, which cuts off U.S. funding to any NGO that so much as mentions the world "abortion," ends up de-funding health clinics that provide contraception, condoms and HIV prevention. As much as anti-choice leaders claim to value life and dislike abortion, their actions don't back it up.

The message is clear: Women are just collateral damage in their ideological Culture War. Our right to life is negotiable.

Comments

[danaseilhan]

But your talk about making abortion rare or preventing abortion IS NOT HELPING US. Will you please stop buying in to the anti-choice side of the argument? If you believe women have the right to choose their reproductive outcomes then you have GOT to trust us REGARDLESS of what that outcome is or how often it happens. STOP MAKING THIS ABOUT MAKING ABORTION RARE. It's true that full access to contraception will likely reduce the incidence of abortion, but saying "make abortion rare" is like saying "make open-heart surgery rare." I hope you can see the absurdity in that.

[camae]

That was a horrifying read and I wish with all my heart that it wasn't true. It truly disgusts and enrages me that so many people use religion as a weapon of hate and ignorance and that because of that women and children primarily pay the price. The Catholic church has in the past showed confusion on exactly when life starts, traditionally it was only when the fetus was first felt to move, called "quickening" it was the human element "men" in the church that decided life started at conception. It was never an original belief of the church. An ectopic pregnancy is in no way viable and is a death sentence to the woman. Until women worldwide have the status of full human beings with full human rights this will continue and we will continue to die needlessly. It is the shame of men everywhere that they are willing to live with this and benefit from it from the repression of more than half of the human race.

[Boobaloo]

Still doubt its mysogyne at the heart of this entire conversation, then read the following by lovely bloggers:

TimtheDemocrat; I think putting every woman who has an abortion in a cage in the public square for a day or two would help instill moral fiber in these sex crazed women.When is Justice Alito going to save all the babies and punish these murderesses?

Miamiman: These women still have a choice (don't open your legs)..The fetus' being killed by the millions have NO CHOICE!

============

Both of these people are men and the anger and deep seeded hatred and judgment of women suggests not only a pathology of mysogyne but, repressed homosexuality.

[Boobaloo]

With the rise in popularity of Christianity the world is becoming an ever more dangerous place for women.

This religion is being used by closeted homosexual men and mysogynsts to destroy all womanhood, its a pathology that we as a globe need to address internationally via the UN.

And we in the United States are among the most 'Christian' and mysogynst on the planet, we need bring ourselves and our nation out of the religious dark ages that these vile snake oil salesman are plunging us into. The rise in this religions power is killing hundreds of thousands in the Middle East and tens of thousands of women around the world. Personal worship belongs in churches and synogogues and mosques NOT in the pathways of government and the judicial system.

The hatred of women is at the heart of every global disaster, when will religion stop breeding this hatred?

[olivine]

I was raised Catholic- in a big way- and the bottom line for me is a woman's body is (or should be), her own. When I think of the Catholic church, I see legions of black-coated males trying to impose some order on the world um, I mean ,females.There is so much concern over an unaware zygote, yet not much at all for animals that ARE aware, a fact obvious even to the simplemind­ed...chimp­anzees and gorillas, say, that communicate their feelings via sign language.

[WOLFWARRIOR]

Miamiman (See profile | I'm a fan of Miamiman)
These women still have a choice (don't open your legs)..The fetus' being killed by the millions have NO CHOICE!

Be responsible for your choices

EVERY RELIGIAC OUT THERE PREACH'S WOMAN BELONG TO THERE OWNER-MAST­ER-HUSBAND - MAN OWN'S WOMEN ....

SO TELL ME EXACTLY WHAT CHOICE ARE THEY GIVEN - OF KEEPING THERE LEGS TOGHTER ?????

.........

[TimtheDemocrat]

Blessed are the piece makers can be interpreted as a prohibition against the hourly wage and this means jesus leaves the heavenly reward to the one who produces (and of course consumes) the most and that is why Hillary has it all but sewn up as she has 35 million vs that muslims' measley 33 million and don't you feel so liberal meanwhile 4 iraqis just died and they haven't been fetus' for a long time is that a sin too?

[TimtheDemocrat]

I think putting every woman who has an abortion in a cage in the public square for a day or two would help instill moral fiber in these sex crazed women. If they can't control their bodies I suggest they consider joining a nunnery and consider GOds' immense love for them. Additionally these women should be marked with a tattoo or perhaps removing a finger? That way men would know that this women might kill their child that belongs to the man. When is Justice Alito going to save all the babies and punish these murderesses? Additionally men should be prosecuted for using condoms because that is exactly the same as murder.

[commonsenselives]

God, I really hope you're being sarcastic because if you're not....

Wow. Just wow. I have seldom encountered such ignorance.

But if you're being sarcastic, then yeah, I get your point.

[Miamiman]

These women still have a choice (don't open your legs)..The fetus' being killed by the millions have NO CHOICE!

Be responsible for your choices

[ammitusen]

um ... i don't suppose it occurs to folks like you that a lot of women don't get to make a choice as to whether they'll have sex or not. i'm not just referring to stranger rape here either. in many marriages, especially in developing countries, the man has his way regardless of what his wife wants (a wife he may have aquired in a transaction with her father). she can "open her legs" or she can refuse, get beaten and THEN "open her legs". she then ends up pregnant with her 7th baby while she's scrounging for food to feed the other 6 as her husband sits under the banyan tree with his buddies bragging about how virile he is.

people like you don't look past your smugly comfortable lives so you can sit high upon your cushioned moral pedastal and make self righteous judgement on powerless poverty ridden women. how nice for you.

[TimtheDemocrat]

how is that choice your mother made not to open her legs working out? made a positive difference on earth yet? I stopped trying to figure that out and just start working on what appears to me to be a huge karmic deficit simply by not being part of the solution.

Is the killing of one more unwanted child worse or better than raising another maladjusted unwanted person on an earth that is already breaking on the weight of 8 billion? Depends on who you ask.

[zizyphus]

"Pro-lifers" are all about controlling women's bodies and punishment, as a result of being brainwashed into believing the printed words in a book of extremely lurid stories concocted in the distant past by men of questionable veracity and sanity.

Were one to find this book, perhaps at the library, without knowing anything about it, and just sit and try to read it, one would close it quickly. The stories are that toxic. They are the stuff of nightmares.

It is little wonder that people, whether brainwashed as kids, or brought into the fold via some tragedy in their lives, take extreme views of the world in which they find themselves, believing that they themselves are evil, surrounded by unseen beings who watch them constantly, and long to torment them forever.

These people need our help, and some rehabilitation, but should not be in positions of power where they can foist their perverted world view on the rest of us.

[TheQuestion]

Reality doesn't matter to a group who are in deep denial. The pro-lifers have blood on thier hands. The church has had blood on it's hands for centuries. Why people still follow is beyond me.

[TimtheDemocrat]

But they are fallen women so they brought this upon themselves, what about the rights of the little unborn babies!? Obviously God is judging them and their deaths will serve as a reminder to just say no to sex outside of Catholic marriage.

[zaft]

Tim:

Perhaps you are unaware that the Catholic Church has a program called "The Rachel Project" that helps women who have had an abortion and regret that they did. Your post indicates that their sin of abortion is unforgivable. Meaning that their sin is greater than God's mercy.

[eddiestardust]

Look, you and I missy, and every other human being, started in the same way.

To abort a baby, willingly, is killing.

If you can see your way clear to that, then you can also do any other thing that is morally wrong.

Now, I certainly don't MAKE YOU or any other woman decide that they are going to get into bed
with a man who probably will throw you away
after he has had his fun.

In other words..it takes TWO to tango, not one.

Both the man and woman have RESPONSIBILITIES
and of course, without the man, no woman would
get pregnant.

A few years ago, Jimmy Carter wrote, that 2/3
of American women have abortions because they
don't know how to take care of the baby.

So why don't we do this....make sure that
women, who turn out to become unwed mothers, do
have a place to call home, have work and are
safe?

Huh?

We Catholics are trying, are you?

[eddiestardust]

And maybe we ought to start telling young men
that it really isn't so ok to have our fun
and say adios to the woman...

Maybe it's better to wait until one is married?

Solves a HECK OF A LOT OF PROBLEMS...doesn't it?

[Auguste]

Look, you and I missy

Oh yeah, you're arguing in good faith from a position of mutual respect.

[Auguste]

"Now, I certainly don't MAKE YOU or any other woman decide that they are going to get into bed
with a man who probably will throw you away
after he has had his fun."

18% of all abortions are provided to married women.

"So why don't we do this....make sure that
women, who turn out to become unwed mothers, do
have a place to call home, have work and are
safe?"

So, essentially, the feminist agenda? Sounds good.

[Quaoar]

Did you even read the post? Pro-Life countries have more abortions than countries with the most liberal abortion laws and much of the reason is the availability of contraception.

Since the Catholic Church officially opposes most forms of birth control, they are probably responsible for more abortions taking place than the most ardent pro-lifers.

To be fair, many Catholics are pro-choice and pro-birth-control or at least tolerant of those positions, but the church as a whole has a long way to go.

[Quaoar]

Oops that should be ardent pro-choicers.

[lisakaz]

Excellent summary of the problem. I guess since God doesn't make mistakes, these deaths are somehow justifieable. I don't get it myself, given the misery for the families of these women. They are collateral damage for control. The blame would be on the woman having sex as others would say. It's as if the problems, even ecoptic pregnancancies, are judgements.

Health and well being should trump everything as a human goal. Sentencing these women to death is nothing short of barbaric. But of course these zealots will not see it.

[mikegoodyearaz85338]

Solution...San Francisco is a "sancuary city" for undocumented immigrants and abortion is legal there. They could have received subsidized, if not free, medical care at the local hospital's emergency room.

Huffingtonpost could set up a fund to pay the transportation costs for these poor women. Can we put a price on 82 lives! Give now.

[ihavenobias]

Should I take this off-topic sarcastic comment to mean you have no good response to the well written article on abortion?