The irony is yours, Mr. Lamborn! In your opinion piece you claim to be on the side of America’s children, yet many times you have voted against CHIP, health care expansion, school funding and Head Start. In order to be pro-child, you must support children both in and out of the mother’s womb and in that you get an F, Mr. Lamborn!
As an OB-GYN, I have had the experience of seeing a mother hemorrhage to death after the birth of her child. It is a sight not easily forgotten. To use every tool in modern medicine’s arsenal to try to save a woman’s life and still fail is a lesson in humility and a life-changing experience. Pregnancy can be dangerous, and an uncomplicated pregnancy and delivery can still result in death even in the best hospital with the best doctors. It is extreme in privilege to legislate mandatory pregnancy on women, by men who will never face this risk. You have voted to repeal access to birth control many times, a law that has proven in studies to lower abortion rates. Once again, I ask how are you “pro-child?”
What the pro-life movement does not want you to know is that “late-term abortion” is exceedingly rare, with only 1,186 performed in 2012 in the U.S. At least 80 percent of these were for lethal fetal anomalies. OB-GYNs often have the job of telling an excited mom-to-be that her baby has a lethal anomaly. These are usually desired pregnancies and the OB-GYN must discuss with the patient the choice of carrying a pregnancy with the risks involved (blood clots, hemorrhage at delivery, emotional toll, pre-eclampsia, babies suffering) versus termination and the risks with that (societal pressures, emotional toll).
In many states, this decision must be made quickly due to gestational age limits on termination and with little societal support due to preconceived notions on termination. As a physician who’s had this conversation many times, I know, many parents, regardless of religion, choose termination. It is the humane decision for both mother and child. We as a society make it difficult for most and almost impossible for the poor. They have to travel many miles, pay cash and walk through picketers to terminate a wanted pregnancy.
If this were your wife, mother, daughter what treatment would you want? Caring, compassionate, and humane or judgmental, zealous picketing?
Finally, I would like to point out that Chaffee County does not have a FQHC. We do have a Planned Parenthood that does not provide abortions. What it does provide is sex education, birth control, pap smears, colposcopy and other preventative health services for the women of Chaffee County. Your opinion, Mr. Lamborn is ill-informed and short-sighted. You do not understand the needs of the women of Chaffee County. If you are interested, there are many Women’s Care providers, including myself, who would be happy to teach you what women’s health care actually looks like, not just the politically motivated version you espouse.
Tiffany Rhodes, M.D.
Salida
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