Abortion Clinic Tragedy

Let me state right at the beginning that I am personally against abortion. I feel that there are enough options out there for both men and women, including abstinence, condom use, and chemical and surgical options, that pregnancy is an extremely remote possibility for the conscientious. However, I understand that a very sizable minority of women want and need abortion as an option, so I feel it should remain safe, legal, and affordable for those times when circumstances out of a woman's control occur and/or an abortion is deemed necessary by the woman/couple/doctor.

Today, I read articles (here's one) about a doctor in Pennsylvania who was running what can only loosely be called an "abortion clinic." From what the article describes, this man was simply a modern day Dr. Frankenstein or, worse, serial killer masquerading as a doctor. I will not go into detail and I advise those with weak stomachs or who get nightmares easily from disturbing images not to read those articles. This man and some of his staff are up on multiple charges of murder.

These articles show why a) abortion needs to be kept legal, b) it needs to be overseen very stringently as a medical procedure, c) it needs supervisory oversight on a very regular basis, and d) women need to consider this a medical procedure and go to an established medical facility with a good record to have an abortion done.

What was described in the articles was similar to what we used to read about pre-legalized, back-alley abortions, where women literally put their own lives at risk to get the procedure done. It hard for a modern mind to wrap itself around the idea of the acts this man performed on these low-income, minority, and recent-immigrant women, who didn't know any better in a lot of cases. It is upsetting to think that no oversight group had been to his clinic to ensure safety and compliance since 1993.

My hope is that they throw the book at this man and his staff for the heinous and barbaric things to which they subjected these women. I hope that this stimulates better oversight and regulation, and certainly better and more frequent in-house inspections, of abortion clinics.

And, in the end, I hope it galvanizes more women to seek pregnancy abatement options outside of abortion, so they don't put themselves at further risk by going to one of these charlatans masquerading as a doctor.