UPDATE, 4/14/23: Governor Laura Kelly has vetoed House Bill 2313, which would have required abortion survivors to receive medical care. Abortion survivor and Abortion Survivors Network founder Melissa Ohden stated in a Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America press release, “Kansas deserves better than Gov. Kelly’s veto of this bill. We remain committed to serving survivors of abortion at any gestational age, along with their mothers, who deserve compassionate prenatal and postpartum care, a delivery plan and emotional support.”
The press release also noted, “According to a McLaughlin poll, 77% of voters support legislation to ensure that a baby who survives a failed abortion be given the same medical treatment as any other baby born prematurely at the same age.”
4/8/23: Legislators in Kansas have passed a bill that would require abortionists to provide appropriate medical care to abortion survivors. It now awaits the governor’s signature, though it passed with a veto-proof majority.
Earlier this week, the Kansas House voted 86-36 in favor of House Bill 2313. The Kansas Senate previously passed the bill with a 31-9 vote last month.
“We’re talking about human life here folks,” Rep. John Eplee, a family physician, said during a debate. “This bill is our best attempt to provide guidelines, guardrails with practitioners that we do as much as we can.”
Yet Rep. Susan Ruiz argued that parents should be allowed to deny a living infant medical care, saying, “The mother, the father, the family have the right to ask for palliative care.”
Abortionists who refuse to give medical care to abortion survivors would face a felony charge, punishable with up to a year’s probation for a first offense, and could also face a lawsuit from the child’s parents. Additionally, the bill would require annual reports on abortion survival be submitted to the state; currently, Kansas does not collect data on how babies who survive induced abortion attempts.
“One important aspect of the bill is that it would require that reporting on abortion survivors,” Kelsey Pritchard, spokesperson for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, told the Associated Press. In another statement to the Kansas City Star, she further added, “It does happen and the way the abortion industry is trying to erase these individuals, who through their lives have to persevere daily over trauma, pain and complication, it’s just appalling.”
Abortion survivors are typically derided by abortion advocates as a myth, but Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data has found at least 100 infants reported to have survived, for at least a short time, after an abortion attempt over a period of 12 years. Yet this number is likely vastly undercounted. In 2021 alone, Minnesota reported that five children in that state survived abortion attempts, though reportedly, none received medical care. Other annual reports found similar survival statistics across five states.
These infants frequently are either given no medical care or are actively killed after being born.
Kansas Governor Laura Kelly previously vetoed similar legislation in 2019. Yet this time, both the House and Senate approved the bill with a two-thirds majority, meaning if she issues another veto, it can be overridden.
