Victims and Villains of RU-486
By Bonnie Chernin Rogoff (03/27/06)
It’s a familiar story. Pro-lifers are portrayed as a small contingent of religious extremists who obsess over fetuses but don’t care about the health and safety of pregnant women. The latest RU-486 abortion tragedy that took the lives of two women proves otherwise. Pro-lifers are outraged. Pro-abortion zealots exhibit misplaced anxieties. They hire lawyers to ban “Choose Life” license plates that they consider a threat but won’t ban a human pesticide that’s deadly for women. The Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice pressures Amazon.com to eliminate the phrase, “Did you mean adoption?” displayed after an abortion book search. These are urgent issues, not women dying.
The two victims were administered RU-486 at Planned Parenthood abortion mills. This brings the total number of fatalities to seven and the number of serious injuries to 850. That is more than enough to ban this drug. However, the FDA continues to stall, preferring to revise the drug labeling and they’ve arranged a meeting with the CDC in May. How many dead women will it take before the FDA stops catering to Planned Parenthood and the powerful abortion lobby?
In the latest RU-486 double tragedy, the cause of death was sepsis, a bacterial infection that is triggered by the drug. Drug abortions are a two-step process in which the first drug is administered at the abortion mill, and the second drug is taken by the woman at home. The second part of the abortion carries the greatest risk of complications. Associated Press reporter Andrew Bridges wrote:
The Food and Drug Administration warned doctors to watch for a rare but deadly infection previously implicated in four deaths of women who had taken the drug. The drug, also called Mifeprex or mifepristone, has not been proved to be the cause in any of those cases. (Associated Press, March 17, 2006)
Not true. Holly Patterson died as a result of being administered RU-486 too late in her pregnancy:
“The County coroner who examined the body of California teenager Holly Patterson, who died in September 2003 after using the abortion drug she obtained at a Planned Parenthood business, said the bacterial infection brought on by the abortion pills caused her death.” ( LifeNews.com )
In October, 2001 a woman’s death was directly attributed to RU-486. She had an ectopic (tubal) pregnancy, and the abortifacient drug combination should never be used in such cases because of potential serious complications.
Several news agencies report an FDA statistic that the risk of infection resulting from drug abortions is comparable to childbirth. The statistic is deceptive. Women who obtain abortions rarely have subsequent contact with the abortion mill once phase one of the drug is complete. Often, they don’t inform their families they’ve taken an abortion drug and by the time life-threatening complications occur it is too late. Women who choose childbirth tell their families, are frequently followed by the same doctor, and complications are more likely to be caught in time before tragedy results.
The New England Journal of Medicine indicates that mifepristone (RU-486) abortions are approved for use only when the pregnancy is less than seven weeks gestation. At this stage, the risk of death from infection is ten times higher with RU-486 than surgical abortions. The article specifies a “black-box” warning included with the original FDA approval, and that “use of the drug could result in incomplete abortion requiring surgical intervention. It advised prescribers to be sure that appropriate provisions were made to provide that care when needed.”
Planned Parenthood issued a statement in the aftermath of the deaths:
“The health and safety of our patients are Planned Parenthood’s top priorities. Due to health concerns about infection rates and adverse events, we are updating our medical protocol for medication abortion. Our health centers will no longer recommend the option of administering misoprostol vaginally.”
Still, Planned Parenthood violates the FDA’s guidelines which state that the second part of a drug abortion should be done in a medical office so the woman can be monitored for adverse reactions. Instead, Planned Parenthood will continue to send women home to complete their drug abortions, subjecting them to the same risks of sepsis that killed the seven victims. The reason they send patients home is obvious. Every woman who returns to the mill for the follow-up procedure takes time away from new abortions, cutting into their lucrative killing business. How much more profitable to have the woman complete her abortion at home, even if she does become another victim.
Planned Parenthood plays down the number of fatalities and injuries related to RU-486. Says Wendy Wright, President of Concerned Women for America:
“The FDA has pulled other drugs that have caused fewer deaths and less severe complications than RU 486. Why the double standard for an abortion drug that is now linked to the deaths of seven healthy women and over 800 other reported complications?”
Drugs pulled by the FDA include NeutroSpec, Tysabri, Lotronex and Bextra. None of these resulted in as many deaths or complications as RU-486.
With all the problems associated with RU-486, the first priority is to stop peddling pharmaceutical abortions to teenagers. That trend is not abating. In Wisconsin, legal efforts are underway to force the FDA to make the Plan B morning-after abortion pill available over the counter without a prescription, and teenagers would have easy access to these powerful hormones. New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton is holding up President Bush’s nomination of Dr. Andrew von Eschenbach as FDA Chairman until a ruling is made regarding OTC distribution of Plan B drugs.
South Dakota recently banned abortion outright and it was a major news story. A new massive Zogby poll of 30,117 respondents in 48 states shows most Americans are strongly pro-life and support many restrictions on abortion. The myth that Roe v. Wade made abortion safer for women is unraveling. Before abortion became a choice it was a criminal enterprise and abusers were jailed. It’s still a criminal enterprise, but the butchers are protected, medical incompetence is rampant and abuses are hard to track down. The consequences of the Roe decision are 47 million dead babies and countless women dead, injured and emotionally scarred. That’s a choice nobody should support.
Copyright 2006 by Bonnie Rogoff.
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