911 tapes: Aborted fetus was breathing
Over the weekend, a Phoenix news station reported new audio evidence about a baby born alive after a botched abortion.
From 12 News KPNX:
“There was a termination that was performed,” the worker said. “There is a fetus that is breathing right now, so we need someone to do services.”
The 911 operator asks if the fetus has been harmed in any way.
The worker answered no, and said the fetus needed further help other than what the clinic could provide.
“The fetus is breathing so we need care for it now,” said the caller. “We can’t provide that care except for oxygen and we’re trying to keep the fetus stable until someone arrives.”
In reaction to the incident and the abortion facility’s response, the Arizona NARAL affiliate later told 12 News, “Nobody did anything wrong…Absolutely nobody did anything wrong. The doctor, in fact, did everything right.”
But as 12 News notes, the pro-life movement’s concern is about the moral questions the scenario raises regarding abortion itself–not what the abortionist did once the baby survived an attempted abortion. How jarring that someone who created the situation of a dying child should be applauded for “doing everything right” in the aftermath?
According to police reports released in April, the baby was estimated to be 21 weeks. The legal limit on abortion in Arizona is 24 weeks gestation–the same as Ohio.
The 2014 Ohio Abortion Report shows that 510 abortions took place on babies after 19 weeks gestation in the state of Ohio. That amounts to almost 20 percent fewer abortions than just four years prior–before our Late-Term Abortion Ban was enacted in 2011.
Undoubtedly, these protections matter.
But Ohio still must face the fact that there are over 500 babies who are being killed halfway through pregnancy.
Ohio has come a long way in responding to the horror experienced by the unborn child in an abortion. But there is still so much more we can do.
Ohio Right to Life firmly believes that the next step in advancing the rights of the human child from conception until natural death is the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, legislation that could protect 500 babies from being painfully dismembered every year.
If this precious Phoenix baby was breathing at 21 weeks, what else was this little one experiencing?
By 20 weeks gestation, pain receptors are present throughout the baby’s body, though they first appear around 6-7 weeks gestation and babies respond to touch at just 8 weeks gestation.