| |
Return to Medicine & Science Page
Mark A. Levine, MD
Chairman, Reference Committee B
American Medical Association
1101 Vermont Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20005
Dear Dr. Levine:
I regret that I am unable to appear before your committee in person, due to previously scheduled surgery. I hope you will share my letter with the other committee members.
I am writing to express my strong support for the AMA’s endorsement of a federal ban on partial-birth abortion. In my view, this procedure cannot and should not be considered “medicine” by any stretch of the imagination. As physicians, we are entrusted with healing and saving lives, especially the most vulnerable and helpless.
As members of your committee may know, partial-birth abortions are performed late in the second trimester of pregnancy, in many cases on viable babies. In this procedure, a doctor pulls out the baby’s feet first, until the baby’s head is lodged in the birth canal. Then, the doctor forces scissors through the baby’s skull, suctions out the brain, and crushes the skull to make extraction easier. Even some pro-choice advocates wince at this procedure, which is difficult to distinguish from infanticide.
The primary reason given for partial-birth abortion-that it is medically necessary to save the mother’s life, health or future fertility-is a false claim, though many people, including President Clinton, were misled into believing it. With all modern medicine has to offer, partial-birth abortions are not needed to save the life of the mother, and the procedure’s impact on a woman’s cervix can put future pregnancies at risk. Reports have concluded that a majority of partial-birth abortions are elective, involving a healthy woman and a normal fetus. The AMA’s panel of experts could find no identified circumstance in which this is the only safe or effective abortion method.
Some opponents of the ban have said that this procedure is needed when severe fetal abnormalities are detected later in pregnancy and the chance of survival outside the womb is rare. Let me admit my personal bias on this important matter. In my 30 years as a pediatric surgeon, I have successfully treated tiny, disabled newborns, some the same age as those aborted babies, and some with conditions identical to those cited as indicators for a partial-birth abortion. For example, I have treated and corrected cases of congenital defects, including cases of omphalocele in which vital organs developed outside the child’s body. I have even replaced hearts in these children’s bodies and seen them grow to live long and productive lives. Ironically, the first such child I ever operated on, who had a huge omphalocele much bigger than her head, went on to develop well and became the head nurse in my intensive care unit many years later.
I agree completely with the statement by the American Medical Association president Daniel Johnson, Jr., MD, that “the partial-delivery of a living fetus for the purpose of killing it outside the womb is ethically offensive to most Americans and physicians” (The New York Times, May 26, 1997). Clearly, there is no medical or other reason for partial-birth abortion in civilized society.
| Sincerely yours,
| C. Everett Koop, MD, ScD
| |
cc: Michael F. Collins, MD
ProLifeForum.org
A Ministry of Proclamation Presbyterian Church
278 Bryn Mawr Avenue
Bryn Mawr, PA 19010
Voice: 610-520-9500
Fax: 610-520-5240
|
|
