Yet again, abortion pills are key to keeping the abortion industry running
Abortion complications have tripled in Pennsylvania over the past five years, according to state health data that also shows 2022 saw the highest number of abortions in the Keystone State in a decade.
On Tuesday, the Pennsylvania Family Institute published an analysis of the latest annual abortion report from the Pennsylvania Department of Health.
34,838 abortions were reported in 2022, at a rate of more than 95 per day. While the level was the highest in 10 years, it was still lower than the average in excess of 36,000 in the first decade of the 2000s.
At the same time, there were more 469 reported abortion complications, an almost 50% increase from 2021, three times the 143 reported five years before (2017), and seven times higher than the 67 reported 15 years earlier (2008).
“More than 75 percent of the complications were related to retained products of conception [i.e., remains of aborted babies left inside the mother’s womb], 14.7 percent to bleeding and 3.6 percent to infection,” the report says.
More than 4,000 of the babies were aborted after 12 weeks (3 months), and more than 500 after 20 weeks (5 months), highlighting both the reality of late-term abortions that Democrats don’t want to prohibit. The report also highlighted that, as is so often the case, blacks made up a share of the abortions (43%) far in excess of their share of the state’s population (11%) and the abortion rate among unmarried women (87%) was unchanged between 2008 and 2022.
Further, the analysis notes that more than half the abortions (19,000) were chemical in nature, as easy access to and wide distribution of abortion pills have been central to the abortion lobby’s efforts to preserve abortion “access” after the loss of Roe v. Wade.
“[T]hese pills are being sent via mail to women across Pennsylvania via telemedicine – abortionists prescribing these pills without verifying the pregnancy, gestational age, or risk of ectopic pregnancy via ultrasound or other tests,” PA Family Institute says. “The PA General Assembly passed a law to ensure abortion would not be used through telemedicine, but yet again former PA Governor Tom Wolf vetoed that legislation in 2020.”
Last August, Pennsylvania Democrat Gov. Josh Shapiro announced he was ending funding for a pregnancy support center that had contracted with the state to provide abortion alternatives for 30 years. State Democrats have also advocated making the state an abortion haven.
In the U.S., 14 states currently ban all or most abortions, with available data so far indicating that now-enforceable pro-life laws could effectively wipe out an estimated 200,000 abortions a year.
In response, abortion allies pursue a variety of tactics to keep the abortion industry going, such as embedding “rights” to abortion in state constitutions, easy access to abortion pills, legal protection and financial support of interstate abortion travel, constructing new abortion facilities near borders shared by pro-life and pro-abortion states, and making liberal states sanctuaries for those who want to evade or violate the laws of more pro-life neighbors.
President Joe Biden has called on Congress to codify a “right” to abortion in federal law, which would not only restore but expand the Roe status quo by making it illegal for states to pass virtually any pro-life laws. The 2024 elections will determine whether Democrats retain the White House and keep or gain enough seats in Congress to make that happen.
Editor’s note. This appeared at LifeSite News and reposted with permission.
Chelsea Garcia is a political writer with a special interest in international relations and social issues. Events surrounding the war in Ukraine and the war in Israel are a major focus for political journalists. But as a former local reporter, she is also interested in national politics.
Chelsea Garcia studied media, communication and political science in Texas, USA, and learned the journalistic trade during an internship at a daily newspaper. In addition to her political writing, she is pursuing a master's degree in multimedia and writing at Texas.
