When will the anti-abortion movement turn its attention to saving babies?
This article originally appeared on Jill.substack.com, the newsletter of journalist, lawyer, and author Jill Filipovich.
From 2010 to 2022, approximately 500 maternity wards across the United States will close, leaving the majority of rural hospitals without delivery rooms. And these numbers were before the Dobbs decision, which criminalized abortion and drove more obstetricians out of conservative states and further reduced access to obstetric care. It became difficult.
Currently, anti-abortion Republicans are calling for bans on abortion, which endanger women’s lives and health during pregnancy, increase maternal injury and mortality, and not expand care for women who are forced to give birth. Resources are being devoted to enforcement. Non-employee or out-of-state health care providers.
The state has a limited budget, and how lawmakers spend that money says a lot. For example, the state of Idaho is using its funds to fight Biden administration rules that require hospitals to do what’s necessary to save women’s lives and keep them healthy, even if it means providing emergency abortions. I’m using a part of it.
Please understand this carefully. The state of Idaho has lost nearly a quarter of its practicing obstetricians and gynecologists since banning abortions, and some labor and delivery wards have closed, but the state says it is not necessary to save women’s lives. They are spending their tax money to make their point. If she is pregnant and there is a medical emergency, the best course of action is an abortion.
I highlight this case next to the data on maternity wards and delivery ward closures because these things are actually relevant, and simply because abortion bans drive doctors away and maternity ward closures. It’s not just because we’re forced to. Abortion bans are not a single issue fought by single-issue political parties. They are part of a broader policy, or lack thereof, that reflects a particular worldview. And to describe that worldview as “pro-life” is by no means reliable.
There is no way to ban abortion and completely protect women’s health.
This is why, to me, the argument that abortion is about saving lives and saving babies comes from political parties and movements that do nothing else to save lives, improve health outcomes, and save babies. , which is why it always feels very disingenuous. If that’s really the motivation of those who want to ban abortion, wouldn’t we see other efforts to save babies’ lives?
Obstetric care deserts are concentrated in conservative regions. One reason for this is that rural areas are more conservative than urban areas, and by definition, rural areas are expected to have smaller populations and fewer services than urban areas. However, even when we adjust for this and look at the ratio of obstetric care providers to women needing pregnancy care, we find that states with abortion bans have far fewer obstetric care providers. Almost all states with the lowest proportion of women of reproductive age among pregnancy care providers have abortion bans.
The closure of labor and delivery departments is simply the result of bad policy. Nearly half of the costs of childbirth in the United States are paid for by Medicaid, and Medicaid reimbursement for childbirth is paid on a per-baby basis, even though the details of childbirth can be incredibly expensive. This is especially true in countries with high birth rates. Emergency caesarean section or when the health of the new mother becomes increasingly poor and critical interventions are often required. Given that labor and delivery wards are an economic loss to hospitals, when hospitals need to cut costs, those wards are the first to go.
But this is not just a Medicaid issue. If that were the case, I think these closures would be more evenly distributed and the health impacts would be more evenly distributed as well. The truth is that more liberal states also invest more in things that improve health. Not only in health care and Medicaid expansion, but also in environmental protection, services for the poor, labor protections, early childhood programs, education, school nutrition, support for pregnant women, and access to abortion. This is not true for all liberal states, but in general, more liberal regions have more policies on public health and welfare, such as education, fair wages, and employment practices that may not be related to health. resources have been invested. At first glance, it is critical to the health outcomes of society as a whole.
And these same liberal regions have a deeper commitment to women’s rights and racial equality, and statewide policies (e.g., equal pay laws and parental leave) reflect that.
There is no way to ban abortion and completely protect women’s health. But there are ways to ban abortion and support mothers and children. The failure of conservative states to fight in court to deny pregnant women emergency medical care strongly suggests that abortion bans are about more than children. are. These states are not refusing to spend on health care. It means spending that money denying women health care rather than ensuring pregnant women can safely deliver their babies and doctors practicing life-saving medicine with impunity. is.
The state has a limited budget, and how lawmakers spend that money says a lot. …They would spend that money denying women health care rather than ensuring that pregnant women can safely deliver their babies.
Banning abortion is a means of social control. The idea that these bans are “pro-life” is in line with other life and health views of the conservative movement, including support for the death penalty, opposition to large investments in public health, and hostility to programs that provide health. does not match. Insurance for children and food for poor families.
However, these bans are based on concerns such as support for blatant misogynists, opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment, hostility to the Equal Pay and Equal Protection Act, and fears of broader changes in gender roles. , consistent with the rest of the conservative movement’s hostility toward women’s rights.
Remember, the anti-abortion movement was born out of a racist movement, but this movement also advocated real causes in the more comfortable terms of states’ rights and parental rights. that the conservative movement and the anti-abortion movement within it have long demonstrated a total lack of regard for human life and welfare, manifested both in the closure of maternity wards and the criminalization of abortion; You can see.
Some of the different policies that led to the closure of maternity wards were brought about by different politicians and different eras than the policies that banned abortion. But they come from the same worldview, which is not life-affirming.