Amber Marlowe, a Pennsylvania woman, reviewed the risks and decided she’d rather not have a C-section. A friend of hers had died from a C-section gone bad, leaving Marlowe understandably nervous about the procedure. (Doctors also claimed that she and her husband had religious objections to surgery, but the Marlowes have said that isn’t true).<\/p>\n
So the doctors presented options to the patient. The patient chose an option the doctor didn’t like. That’s the end of it, right?<\/p>\n
Wrong. The hospital, Wilkes-Barre General, went to a judge and got a secret order, subjecting Marlowe to a C-section by force<\/a>, regardless of her wishes.<\/p>\n Fortunately, the Marlowes were able to reach another hospital to give birth and – despite the doomsday predictions of the first hospital’s doctors – gave vaginal birth to a healthy baby.<\/p>\n Pendolphi and several other attorneys questioned Conahan’s order, saying they knew of no legal authority that gave the judge the power to appoint a guardian for a fetus.<\/p>\n “Even if you think the fetus is a person, in America we don’t allow the courts to decide between two people and order one to undergo surgery for the other,” said Lynn Paltrow, an attorney with the National Advocates for Pregnant Women in New York.<\/p><\/div>\n I thought this quote, from a pro-life activist, was particularly good at illustrating the pro-life position.<\/p>\n (Okay, I took that quote a bit out of context – but not much.)<\/p>\n If this were a man refusing to have surgery – even surgery his doctors felt was essential – there’d be no question of forcing him to undergo the surgery. Even if the surgery were for a kidney transplant for his son – without which, the man’s son would die – no one would even suggest surgery against his will.<\/p>\n Yet somehow, get a woman pregnant and too many people believe she’s lost all rights. This sort of case is why pro-lifers have a reputation for thinking of women as holding tanks for babies..<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Amber Marlowe, a Pennsylvania woman, reviewed the risks and decided she’d rather not have a C-section. A friend of hers had died from a C-section gone bad, leaving Marlowe understandably nervous about the procedure. (Doctors also claimed that she and … Continue reading