Abortion Methods Described

(Plus, Misleading Claims about Abortion)

Suction Abortion: Used during the first three months of pregnancy - A suction tube (27 times stronger than a home vacuum cleaner) is inserted into the womb. The powerful suction tears the baby apart limb from limb and sucks it from the womb along with the placenta. The baby's remains are deposited into an attached waste bottle.

Dilation and Curettage (D&C): Used at the end of the third month of pregnancy (approximately 12 weeks) - The cervix is dialated, ring forceps are inserted into the womb and the baby is extracted piece by piece. Then a curette (a sharp knife in a loop shape) is inserted and used to scrape away any of the baby or the placenta that remains. Profuse bleeding follows.

Dilation and Extraction (D&E): Used after 13 weeks - The cervix is dialated and the unborn child is dismembered with plier-like forceps. Force is needed to pull the baby apart. The instrument is used to seize a leg or other part of the body and then, with a twisting motion, tear it from the baby's body. The baby's spine is snapped and the skull crushed. After the baby parts are removed, they are reassembled outside the womb to be sure all are removed. Frequently baby parts are left inside the mother's womb. This can cause serious complications and sometimes death.

Help is available for women who have been injured by abortion or for the families of women who have died from abortion. You can read about tragic abortion injury cases and find out who to call for legal help by clicking: Abortion Injuries or Deaths? Call: 1-800-U-CAN-SUE.

Partial-Birth Abortion: Partial-Birth Abortions are used from the 4th month through the end of the 9th month of pregnancy. These late-term abortions are regularly used to kill healthy babies that pose no danger or threat to their mother.

For this abortion, the abortionist uses ultrasound to locate the unborn baby's legs. Forceps are then used to pull the baby's legs through the birth canal, delivering the baby feet first, except for the head. Scissors are then used to puncture the base of the back of the head. A suction device is then inserted to suction out the baby's brain so the skull will easily collapse. The dead baby is then removed.

Congress and the Senate voted twice to outlaw these gruesome abortions. Unfortunately, President Clinton wants them to remain legal and he vetoed the bill both times the legislation was sent to him for his signature. Because of President Clinton's two vetoes, this horrifying method of child-killing remains legal today.

Why would Clinton veto a ban on Partial-Birth Abortion when so many doctors and medical professionals were recommending that they be outlawed? The American medical Association's Council on Legislation voted UNANIMOUSLY to recommend to the AMA Board of Trustees to endorse the Ban on Partial-Birth Abortions.

Former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, along with hundreds of physicians and the Physicians' Ad Hoc Coalition for Truth (PHACT) said that this "procedure" is never necessary to save the life of the mother.

Dr. Nancy Romer, FACOG, Chairman of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Miami Valley Hospital in Ohio said, "People deserve to know that the partial-birth abortion is never medically indicated either to save the health of a woman or preserve her future fertility."

Dr. Martin Haskell, an abortionist who specializes in these late-term abortions, has admitted to performing over 1,000 of these abortions. He stated in a recorded interview with the American Medical News (the official newspaper of the AMA) that: "In my particular case, probably 20% (of these procedures) are for genetic reasons. And the other 80% are purely elective." That means in 80% (that's over 800 babies) there was no health risk for the mother and the baby had no handicaps.

It has been documented that thousands of these abortions are performed each year. A New Jersey newspaper reporter with the Bergen County Record discovered and reported that 1,500 babies are killed each year by partial-birth abortion at one New Jersey "Hospital" alone.

It's hard to know exactly how many of these abortions are performed each year, but we do know that the Centers for Disease Control reported there are over 17,000 abortions performed each year on babies older than 4 1/2 months gestation. Whether it's partial-birth abortion, or some other barbaric method, it's a tragic holocaust.

If you would like to voice your outrage over these late-term abortions, please call the abortion telephone poll at 1-900-PRO-LIFE. You can find information about the telephone poll on our website by clicking 1-900-PRO-LIFE telephone poll.

Saline amniocentesis: Used after 16 weeks - A concentrated salt solution is injected with an amniocenteses needle into the amniotic fluid. The baby breathes and swallows it and dies over an hour later of acute salt poisoning. The mother then delivers a dead burned baby. Use has declined because of dangers for the mother and sometimes the baby survives.

Prostaglandin: Used late-term - Prostaglandin is injected into the amniotic sac causing premature labor and delivery of a dead baby.

Inter-cardiac injections: Poison is injected into the chest or heart of the fetus via a long needle inserted through the mother’s abdomen. The dead baby is absorbed. Sometimes this results in the loss of all the babies when using this method for "pregnancy reduction" with multi-fetal pregnancies.

Chemical Abortions: The Pill, RU486, methotrexate, Norplant, IUD’s, prostaglandin’s, and Depo Provera all cause early abortions. You may not be aware of the fact that the Pill has a "back up" abortifacient action that works to kill a baby very early in its development if ovulation occurs and conception takes place. With some of the new "mini-pills," scientific research shows that ovulation takes place in 67-81% of the women who use these "birth control pills."

Dr. Ronald Chez, a scientist at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), publicly stated that the new Pills of today, with their lower estrogen dose, allow ovulation up to 50% of the time! It is estimated that Chemical "Contraceptives" cause between 7 to 12 million early abortions each year in America (Source: Study of Abortion Deaths Ad Hoc Commission 1995). Most women using the Pill (and other "birth control" methods listed above) do not know they can become pregnant and have early abortions.

To find out more about the Pill and other chemicals that cause early abortions, click on: "Birth Control Abortions".

Misleading Claims about Abortion . . .

Claim: "It's my body."

Answer: A woman's body does not have two beating hearts, two blood types, two heads, four eyes, four arms, and four legs. A pregnant woman and her baby have all this and more. And what about when she's pregnant with a male baby? That's not her body . . . it's a unique, baby boy growing in her womb.

Claim: "It's only a fetus."

Answer: FACT: A fetus is a human being..... Fetus -- literally meaning "little one" in Latin -- refers to the pre-born baby after eight week's gestation. Webster's Dictionary says a fetus has, "passed the early stages of development and attained the basic final form prior to parturition (birth)." Some people seem to have forgotten they once lived and grew in the womb as a "fetus." Would it have been okay if they had been aborted when they were "only a fetus?"

Claim: "Abortion is legal, therefore, it must be right."

Answer: The U.S. Supreme Court has been wrong on many major decisions and then overturned itself. Remember the Dred Scott case on slavery? If the Supreme Court suddenly declared child abuse or rape legal, would that make them right? Would we ignore such injustices and do nothing to protect the innocent?

Claim: "Freedom of Choice" - It's a woman's "right to choose!"

Answer: How can anyone claim they have the "freedom" or "right" to kill an innocent baby? The only "choice" in abortion is between a dead baby and a live baby. Furthermore, advocates who defend this "choice" are not consistent. Why is it only in the case of abortion they argue that "choice" should be absolute? Using the same rationale, wouldn't people have the right to "choose" to use drugs ("it's my body") or the right to "choose" to practice prostitution? Humane societies don't tell people they have a "Freedom of Choice" to kill their own children. There are right choices and wrong choices. In recent history, millions of innocent people died because of terribly wrong choices which slave owners and Nazis thought they had a "right" to make. Terrible choices have led to dead slaves, dead Jews, and dead babies.

Claim: "The government shouldn't interfere."

Answer: Our Declaration of Independence declares that each of us has an "inalienable right to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness." Thomas Jefferson defined government's role, "The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only object of good government." Government should protect all of us, especially before we are born, when we are most vulnerable.

Claim: "Poor women need public funds (your tax money) to pay for abortions so they're not be discriminated against."

Answer: The rich can readily afford cocaine and prostitutes. Should taxpayers also be forced to buy these for the poor? The bottom line is that abortion is the worst form of child abuse. It kills a baby and wounds the mother for life. If the poor cannot afford abortions, they and their children are blessed not to become victims of this bloody holocaust.

Claim: "I'm personally opposed to abortion, but I would not impose my morality on others."

Answer: What about other moral issues like rape, robbery, child abuse, arson and murder? What if politicians said, "I'm personally opposed, but . .. ." They'd be kicked out of office on the spot! What about slavery? If abolitionists had bought this "personally opposed, but" argument, some states could still be saddled with slavery today. Every law ever passed sets standards which reflect someone's (or a body of lawmakers') morality. A politician who won't vote against something he/she is morally opposed to doesn't have an ounce of honesty in his/her blood.

Claim: Privacy - "In 1973, The Supreme Court said women have a "constitutional right" to privacy on abortion."

Answer: The Court has been wrong before and it is wrong on this decision. Nobody has a right to injure or kill another person "privately." Does a "right to privacy" also protect parents who abuse, molest or kill their born children in the "privacy" of their home? Why not? What about their "privacy?" How is it that Roe v. Wade determined that unborn children are not "persons" even though they have the right to inherit property, the right to be protected from a drug-addicted mother, the right not to be killed by a drunk driver, and many other rights. Some states have entire sections of law outlining Crimes Against Unborn Children in which they are protected from negligent or willful harm or death from conception on.

Claim: "Dred Scott and Roe v. Wade aren't comparable."

Answer: Yes, they are comparable in that the Supreme Court was wrong to deny inalienable rights in both cases. The Dred Scott decision of 1857 upheld slavery as legal. That was wrong. It decreed that black people are the private property of the slave owners. This was a grave error made by the Supreme Court, denying African-Americans one of their most fundamental human rights -- the right to Liberty. In Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court erred again by denying a whole class of human beings (pre-born babies) the most fundamental right -- the right to Life.

Claim: "If legal abortions are banned, women will resort to dangerous back alley abortions."

Answer: In 1972, the year before the Supreme Court legalized abortion, a total of 39 women died from illegal abortions, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. Dr. Bernard Nathanson, co-founder of NARAL (National Abortion Rights Action League), admits his group lied and inflated the number of women who died from illegal abortion when testifying before the U.S. Supreme Court in 1972: "We spoke of 5,000 - 10,000 deaths a year. I confess that I knew the figures were totally false . . . it was a useful figure, widely accepted, so why go out of our way to correct it with honest statistics?" Claims that abortion became safer for women after it was legalized fail to acknowledge that large numbers of women are physically injured or killed by so-called "safe and legal" abortions every year. The book "Lime 5" documents 230 cases of women injured or killed by abortion or sexually assaulted by their abortionists (see page 18 and www.prolife.com for details). Former abortion provider Carol Everett states, "In the last 18 months I was in business (Everett ran four abortion centers in Texas in 1982), we were completing 500 abortions monthly and killing or maiming one woman out of 500."

Claim: Rape & incest - "Abortion should be legal to end a pregnancy resulting from rape or incest."

Answer: It's important to remember that the child conceived in rape, or incest, is no less human than any other child. Dr. David Reardon (www.afterabortion.com) points out that abortion is the very worst "solution" that can be offered to the pregnant woman at this crisis time in her life. Abortion compounds her problems. Abortion makes her an aggressor against her own innocent child and it never makes the painful memories of rape go away. If a small child were killed in the street by a negligent driver and it was later determined that the child had been conceived in rape, would the driver be held less responsible? Is that child's death less tragic?

Claim: "It's a woman's issue. Men should have no say."

Answer: Every baby has a mother and a father. Why should fathers be denied their parental rights? Men have a natural instinct to defend the innocent and the weak. More than half of America's pro-life movement is made up of women who want men to join their cause. Many women became pro-life after discovering their abortion was a terrible mistake. They know how painful abortion is from first hand experience and many ask men to get involved so fewer women and babies will become victims of abortion.