A recent Huffington Post article, “There’s Nothing Cavalier About Late-Term Abortion,” makes a telling point with its title, even though it was written by Laura Akers in support of abortion. Indeed, late-term abortion (or any abortion) shouldn’t be cavalier, especially when it’s a barbaric procedure that ends the life of a child so close to birth. In telling her personal story, Akers manages to mislead on the realities of late-term abortion.
Late-Term Abortion is, in Fact, Barbaric
Akers criticizes those who would talk about the procedure being “barbaric, cruel, and, worst and most ugly of all, cavalier about the lives of their babies.” The procedure of late-term abortion is “barbaric [and] cruel,” though. (You can find out how in the video here.)
Akers laments, with original emphasis, that a diagnosis informed her that her baby, if he survived the pregnancy, “would be born with severe physical and mental defects, and in excruciating pain. Most of the babies born like this live only a few days.” She also notes that a “handful make it a year with constant medical intervention and unfathomable, constant pain. None survive to adulthood.”
Former abortionist, Dr. Anthony Levatino, describes one of the methods used in late-term abortions:
Does the tragedy of a terminal diagnosis, which doctors cannot be 100 percent certain of, make a late-term abortion any less barbaric, cruel, and painful for the child? Sadly, no. Perhaps Akers was not told exactly what her abortion would entail for her son, since she writes that the abortion would be painful for her without mentioning what it would do to him. Akers appears to be unaware of the cruelty and violence involved for the baby in late-term abortion procedures, as she focuses on the pain of his predicted short life, but not on the pain the abortion could cause him as she says he would take days to die:
“Terminating the pregnancy — sparing my tiny boy this hellish ordeal — meant a procedure that would have taken two days…two days of knowing, of feeling, my baby dying inside me.”
The kind of abortion Akers speaks of is likely induction abortion, another type that Dr. Levatino explains in this video:
Terminal Diagnoses, Disabilities, and Abnormalities Do Not Give Us the Right to Take Life
Fetal abnormalities, especially those with such a likelihood of death so soon after birth, are not easy to deal with. Yet it does not mean that we have the authority to decide who lives or dies, especially when the child is an innocent, defenseless, and vulnerable human life. Live Action News’ writer, Sarah Terzo, answers the question: “Is abortion justified if the baby will die anyway?” here.
Surprisingly, Akers reveals that she did not have her abortion, as her son was later found to be healthy. Yet instead of pointing out the problems with prenatal testing, she continues to focus her support on late-term abortions. Imagine if her son had been aborted. It would have been tragic if he had a terminal condition, and it would also have been tragic if he were one of the babies aborted based on a false diagnosis of disability.
The Truth About What Abortion Does Matters
Akers also lays on criticism for those who speak out in opposition to late-term abortion: “Anyone who would add even an ounce to the suffering me and my husband endured — either in how they talk about late-term abortion or in advocating roadblocks or an outright ban — is a monster.”
This further confirms that Akers must not know how a late-term procedure actually works. How can people be “monster[s]” for wanting to spare children this kind of pain? Dr. Levatino, explains his own personal pro-life conversion in the video below.
Clearing Up More Misinformation About Late-Term Abortion
Akers misleads by claiming it is “simply not the case” that late-term abortions occur because there are “women out there who carry their child for 39.5 weeks and then decide, on a whim, to have them killed because, what? They are suddenly selfish? They suddenly decided they wanted a boy and not a girl? Or because their husbands told the American people that they don’t find women attractive once they have babies?”
However, the sad reality is that late-term abortions are committed all too often on healthy babies. This is a documented fact, coming from the mouths of those who perform these abortions.
Planned Parenthood, ever the champion of any and all abortions, has been documented agreeing to perform same-sex abortions, which often occur late-term, after 20 weeks (when science shows the baby almost undeniably feels pain).
Akers also notes that abortions cannot be obtained after 26 weeks “except under the most dire of circumstances.” However, if a woman and an all-too-willing abortionist decide her reason for a late-term abortion can be classified under “health” in any way shape or form, they can go forward after 26 weeks under Roe v. Wade’s companion case of Doe v. Bolton in many states. In fact, “the World Health Organization defines health of the mother as ‘any condition that might impact her physical, emotional, psychological or financial well being.'”
Despite the tragedy of diagnoses like the one Akers originally received, there are parents who bravely choose life. Some of the babies survived longer than expected and defied the odds; others did not. But each child was treated with dignity, love, and respect as a human being for as long as they did survive. There is also help for these parents through perinatal hospice care.
An abnormal or terminal fetal diagnosis can be tragic and scary — whether it’s accurate or not — but it doesn’t need to end in an abortion.
