One could not help taking serious and concerned notice of, “The ‘right to life’ will end up killing women” by Kathryn Anne Edwards, recently printed in the Attleboro, MA 'Sun Chronicle.' Quoting from a study which she didn’t cite, (“Homicide During Pregnancy and the Postpartum Period in the United States, 2018-2019”), Edwards wrote, “homicide is the leading cause of death among pregnant and postpartum women”, and then claimed that the overturning of Roe will only make it worse.
The study concluded, “increasing efforts within individual states have been devoted to identifying and reviewing maternal deaths due to violence to make recommendations… for the prevention of future cases… a commitment to the actual implementation of policies and investments known to be effective at protecting and promoting the health and safety of girls and women must follow.” Shelters, pregnancy counseling, and adoption are among those effective ways already in place, but clearly more needs to be done. But nowhere in this report is abortion even hinted at as a solution.
Edwards was clearly not concerned with the killing of a pre-born child. Her main concern is that, “abortion… gives women the power to exit relationships”, even referring to it as “bargaining power” over a man for a woman wanting out of a parental relationship.
There are valid reasons for ending a relationship like unfaithfulness, abandonment, and certainly abuse, but to use the ability to terminate the life of a pre-born child as a positive means to terminate a relationship is a profoundly callous and disturbing recommendation and goal for solving abuse.
There are many and complicated social ills like abuse in this world for which there not easy answers. But one of those answers is not abortion. A trauma is not dealt with and solved by introducing another trauma.
The counter to the title of her piece could be worded, “Abortion is not only the leading cause of death for pre-born children, it’s the 100%, every single time outcome.” A woman and a child go into an abortion mill like the one in Attleboro, and the child comes out dead and the woman wounded: mentally, emotionally and many times physically injured, and thus abused as well.