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- Americans who hold opposing views on abortion should be able to agree that the risk of these procedures should be fully disclosed to women, writes Kimberly Ross.
In the nearly three years since the decision in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization was handed down by the Supreme Court, the abortion landscape in America has changed. So too the discourse surrounding it. The Dobbs decision overturned Roe and Casey and returned the issue back to the states. This has been received as both a positive and negative by individuals on both sides of the abortion equation. States that lean left, like California, Illinois, and New York, have rather permissive abortion laws. Conversely, states like Kentucky, Mississippi, and Texas have restrictive laws.
One thing that has increased since Dobbs is the number of medication abortions in the United States. In 2023, medication abortion accounted for 63% of the total number of abortions in the country. This is a 10% increase from 2020. A major, if not the ultimate, reason behind the increase is the change in abortion laws. But abortion is not banned in the U.S. outright despite the narrative some try to sell. Traveling across state lines is an option. Those who don’t wish to or can’t travel often choose medication abortion.
A medication abortion involves taking two pills, mifepristone and misoprostol, to induce a non-surgical abortion. It’s branded as a convenient alternative. It’s also more dangerous than expected or marketed. And the abortion industry must be clear about that.
A new study out from the Ethics & Public Policy Center indicates adverse effects from the combination medication abortion regimen are more common than expected. The study looked at “865,727 prescribed mifepristone abortions from 2017 to 2023.” And according to the published study, “10.93 percent of women experience sepsis, infection, hemorrhaging, or another serious adverse event within 45 days following a mifepristone abortion. The real-world rate of serious adverse events following mifepristone abortions is at least 22 times as high as the summary figure of ‘less than 0.5 percent’ in clinical trials reported on the drug label.”
Regardless of where one stands on the abortion issue as a whole, this is a serious problem, one that has seemingly been ignored, especially by Democratic lawmakers. This is partly due to the fact that pinning responsibility on President Trump and other Republicans in office is a goal. Considering there has been a marked increase in the number of medication abortions, the danger should be addressed.
Amber Nicole Thurman was a 28-year-old woman living in Georgia when she died of sepsis following a medication abortion in 2022. After taking both pills as instructed, Thurman experienced intense cramping and severe blood loss, eventually causing her to lose consciousness. She was taken to the hospital. But instead of performing surgery to remove remaining fetal tissue, doctors instead treated her with antibiotics. A reported 19 hours after arriving at the hospital, doctors performed surgery. By then it was too late.
Thurman’s death was indeed preventable. The hospital is certainly at fault for delayed care. But the risks associated with medication abortion are much higher than advertised. Amber Nichole Thurman might be here today if she had known about the real risk of medication abortion and had received better care by hospital staff in Georgia. She might also be here if lies about abortion bans were not treated as truth.
During her campaign for president, Kamala Harris repeated Amber Nicole Thurman’s story as some sort of “proof” the Dobbs decision is literally killing women. By extension, President Trump has also been blamed for causing harm to women for his role in nominating three justices who joined the majority opinion on Dobbs. This isn’t hyperbole. At least two ads from the Harris-Walz campaign said as much.
Just this week, ProPublica won the Pulitzer Prize for public service for reporting on abortion bans and their effects. But ProPublica did not hold back in claiming abortion bans cause death, including that of Amber Nicole Thurman. Somehow, this narrative is given a prize for journalism when it’s little more than fear-mongering.
In Georgia, where Thurman lived and died, the abortion ban does not prohibit a D&C in cases when the mother’s life is at risk, especially after no fetal cardiac activity is present. Even the Abortion Defense Network is clear about this in their Guide for Medical Professionals. Yet, ProPublica, Kamala Harris, and other Democratic Party lawmakers insist the bans, a product of Trump, caused Thurman’s death. There is no truth to this. Medication abortion, more dangerous than expected, and incompetent, ignorant medical staff at Piedmont Henry Hospital caused her death.
Americans who hold opposing views on abortion should be able to agree that the risk of these procedures should be fully disclosed to women. This is especially true during a time when abortion laws seemingly change overnight and tensions remain high. As it stands now, it appears there is an attempt to make medication abortion seem a safer, more convenient alternative. And the insistence that Trump and other elected Republicans don’t care about women continues.
Abortion ends the life of a new and growing human life. There is no avoiding this truth. Each abortion is a willful decision and a tragedy. Any narrative presenting unborn life as just a clump of cells does so to dilute the truth and make abortion more palatable. Abortion harms babies by literally ending their lives. Abortion also harms women, as is made clear by growing evidence from data collected about medication abortions. The pharmaceutical industry must address that the incident rate of adverse effects from medication abortion is much higher than is portrayed.
The number of medication abortions increases each year. This is sure to continue in the post-Dobbs era. Given that reality, the documented, harmful effects on women as a result of chemical abortion are impossible to ignore.
Kimberly Ross
