Abortion Clinics Grind Up Remains of Aborted Babies and Flush Them in the Sewer

By Dierdre Cooper
Life News

The undercover videos released by the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) in 2015 were shocking to many pro-lifers, especially to those in Texas where much of the footage was obtained. We learned even more about the gruesome practices of the abortion industry: their eagerness to profit from selling body parts from aborted babies was disturbing, even for an industry that profits from ripping apart unborn babies in the womb.

Sadly, the United States Supreme Court severely limits what pro-life laws can be enacted at the state and federal level. This is due to the Court’s ruling in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which holds that judges can strike down laws if they constitute an “undue burden” to women seeking an abortion. However, that hasn’t stopped us from trying several different approaches to promote a culture of life in Texas. One important legislative issue we have been working on in response to the CMP videos has been to require the humane disposition of aborted babies.

In Texas, the remains of aborted babies may be disposed of by interment, cremation, incineration followed by interment, steam disinfection followed by interment, grinding fetal remains and flushing them in the sewer system or discarding them in landfills. In 2016, the Department of State Health Services proposed a rule change, and then last legislative session, the Texas Legislature passed a law, SB 8, removing the options of grinding fetal remains and flushing them in the sewer system or discarding them in landfills.

This law would not make abortion illegal or more difficult to obtain. To use the legal jargon of the Court, it did not create any “substantial obstacle” to women obtaining abortions. She still has a completely free choice whether to choose abortion. The law would simply allow the state to recognize the human dignity of the aborted child, and treat those remains with the respect they deserve.

Unfortunately, the U.S. District Court has issued a preliminary injunction against the state of Texas from enforcing the law.

One of the major objections to the law has been a made up claim by abortion supporters that SB 8 will increase the cost of abortions so much that it will make abortion unaffordable to many women. This is completely untrue.

In Texas, the Texas Catholic Conference of Bishops worked tirelessly to find private funeral homes and cemeteries who were willing to transport and bury aborted babies for free or at low cost. At trial, the abortion facilities’ own expert witness estimated the increased cost would be less than $5 per abortion. This could hardly be seen as an excessive increase in the cost of an abortion. Certainly, the state’s interest in respecting the dignity of the unborn child outweighs the minor cost increase.

If abortion supporters truly don’t believe aborted unborn babies are human beings, why are they so opposed to pro-lifers transporting and burying those clumps of cells? What harm does it do to them, if they are not involved in the transport or burial of the remains anyway?

Texas has the right, and the duty, to respect the human dignity of all people, including the unborn. This right was recognized in Gonzales v. Carhart, the case that upheld the partial-birth abortion ban, where the Court insisted that states may express their “profound” respect for the dignity of the life of the unborn. That right does not allow them to take the abortion decision away from women, but it does allow states to require the bodies of aborted unborn babies to be treated humanely.

LifeNews Note: Deirdre Cooper is a public policy analyst for Texas Alliance for Life, one of the leading pro-life organizations in Texas, where she has successfully lobbied for the sonogram law, Choose Life license plate, defunding Planned Parenthood, and HB 2. She is also a board member for And Then There Were None Pro-Life Outreach. This article originally appeared at the Society of St. Sebastian.

Website: Life News

British City May Vote to Ban Pro-Life Prayer Vigils Outside Local Abortion Clinic

By SPUC

Life News

Ealing Council cabinet unanimously voted to begin a public consultation on introducing a public space protection order (PSPO) to stop pro-life vigils outside Ealing’s Marie Stopes (MSI) clinic.

Following the vote, the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) has urged people to make very clear to Ealing Council, via the upcoming public consultation, that prolife groups should not be prevented from helping pregnant women to keep their babies.

SPUC said that “the decision by Ealing Council to hold a public consultation means it is more important than ever that those who support prolife vigils speak out against those seeking to deny women help, and to undermine freedom of speech.”

Buffer Zone Helps MSI, Not Women

Appearing on BBC‘s Victoria Derbyshire programme yesterday, MSI’s John Hansen-Brevetti claimed that women who didn’t enter the Ealing clinic (due to the “protesters”) were “just going to clinics elsewhere”. The Good Counsel Network’s Clare McCullough had already corrected that statement in an earlier radio appearance, pointing out that “hundreds” of women had accepted assistance from the Good Counsel Network (GCN), and “most of the women we’ve helped were in Ealing”. 

Mrs McCullough affirmed that a ban of pro-life vigils would support the business interests of the MSI clinic, who “have lost about 13% of their clientele in the last year, that [GCN] have figures for.”

“They don’t know to what extent women are turning round because of our help. We do know that large numbers of women are turning around because of the help that’s being offered, because we’re seeing many of them come into our Women’s Centre.”

The MSI clinic’s treatment of women was also called into question, with reference to damning reviews on the NHS Choices website and past experiences of post-abortive women who now support the Good Counsel Network. Marie Stopes was condemned in a Care Quality Coommission report less than six months ago, for a whole host of abuses and safety failings.

Rating on the NHS Choices website from a woman who experienced the MSI “cattle market”

Pro-Life Vigils are Conducted Lawfully and Respectfully

During his airtime, John Hansen-Brevetti continues to repeat unsubstantiated claims against the Good Counsel Network, including physically blocking access to the clinic. 

In an almost comical moment of the radio interview, Clare McCullough was asked to confirm or deny these assertions:

“So, you don’t shut the gate on them?”
“No we don’t find that very helpful in reaching women to try and offer them alternatives.”

Life News article continues here

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National Hotline: Call 1-800-712-HELP or Text 'HELPLINE' to 313131.
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If you or someone you know is suffering after abortion, confidential non-judgmental help is available.  Call Project Rachel's national toll-free number 888-456-HOPE (4673) or visit hopeafterabortion.org.  

Will Caroling at Abortion Clinics Save Lives This Christmas?

By Rod Anderson, CP Cartoonist
Christian Post

A major pro-life organization is overseeing a nationwide campaign this month to have Christmas caroling performed outside approximately 80 abortion clinics.

Known as "Peace in the Womb," the caroling events are organized by the Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League, which has been observing this annual campaign since 2003.

Read more at Christian Post 'Peace in the Womb'

"When you come out to an abortion facility to sing Christmas carols, you come face to face with the wounds of our society — and in our hearts — that Christ was born to heal."  Eric Scheidler, Pro-Life Action League

Federal Judge Strikes Down Buffer Zone Law at Abortion Clinics

By Fr. Mark Hodges
Life Site News

In a powerful victory for the sanctity of innocent human life, a federal judge has thrown out a “buffer zone” law as anti-free speech.

Last week, U.S. District Court Judge Susan Wigenton, a George W. Bush appointee, ruled that an Englewood, New Jersey, “buffer zone” ordinance was unconstitutional.

In 2014, the Englewood city council passed an ordinance prohibiting pro-life advocates from coming within eight feet of abortion businesses’ entrances or driveways. The law also criminalized giving pro-life pamphlets to women, even if they ask for literature.

Pro-lifer Jeryl Turco, who had done sidewalk counseling outside Metropolitan Medical Associates for seven years, challenged the city ordinance in 2015, and after a two-year court battle, she won.

Noting a unanimous 2014 U.S. Supreme Court decision that a Massachusetts buffer zone was unconstitutional, Judge Wigenton determined the Englewood ordinance was too broad, that the city hadn’t tried less radical measures to address concerns, and that the “buffer zone” violated First Amendment freedoms of speech and assembly.

One News Now reported that the abortionists’ case was “based on false allegations.” Pro-lifers were accused of shouting, pushing people, and blocking entrances.

Those allegations are “not true,” Marie Tasy of New Jersey Right to Life told One News Now. “In fact, the court found no evidence of any arrests or clinic harassment or violence in the last five years or more. The court therefore said that the buffer zone law was unjustified.”

Judge Wigenton wrote in her decision that city officials “did not create a targeted statute to address the specific issue of congestion or militant and aggressive protesters outside of the clinic.”

“The ordinance established a buffer zone that extended to eight feet on either side of the clinic’s doorway and its driveway,” Tasy explained. “So it was very, very broad and the court found that the Englewood abortion clinic had not tried a less-restrictive approach to governing the clinic entrance before enacting this ordinance.”

The local chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW) expressed “disappointment” in the ruling. “The buffer helped because people’s personal space was not infringed upon,” Northern New Jersey NOW President Bonnie Shapiro said.

“The New Jersey decision is a great example of clear constitutional reasoning,” Liberty Counsel chairman Mat Staver said. “The decision should be an encouragement to pro-life sidewalk counselors around the country.”

Staver noted that Judge Wigenton’s decision was “uncorrupted by the ‘abortion distortion’ that has pervaded so many court decisions since Roe v. Wade.” He added that the ruling should deter government officials who “abdicate their duties to uphold the constitutional rights of their citizens in order to carry water for Planned Parenthood.”

Life Site News article continues

PA Abortion Clinics Inspection Reports Online

When Kermit Gosnell’s Philadelphia “House of Horrors” abortion facility was closed in 2010 it was not because of vigilant oversight by the Pennsylvania Department of Health -- it was the indirect result of an investigation into illegal prescription drug activity at the clinic.  Up to that point, inspections at the Gosnell clinic were irregular in the early years of his practice which opened in 1979 and then non-existent for the last 17 years.  In response to the horrific conditions found at the clinic during an FBI raid, Pennsylvania lawmakers in 2011 passed regulations that abortion centers must be licensed as outpatient surgical centers with routine inspections. These inspection surveys (for all healthcare facilities) are posted online on the Pennsylvania Department of Health website. 

The website states:
“The information posted on the Department of Health's website is posted in accordance with requirements imposed by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). These healthcare facility search pages contain information regarding healthcare facility compliance with regulatory requirements for licensure and for certification. Licensure permits the facility to operate in Pennsylvania. Certification permits the facility to claim and receive payment for services rendered from the Medicare and Medicaid programs. The Department of Health, as state licensing agency and State Survey Agency for CMS, conducts both routine and special inspections of health care facilities to determine ongoing compliance with regulatory requirements which is a condition of licensure and certification. If, during an inspection, the Department determines a facility does not meet regulatory requirements for licensure and certification, the Department notifies the facility in a Statement of Deficiencies. Health care facilities are required to submit a Plan of Correction in response to the Statement of Deficiencies. The Plan of Correction is mandatory, regardless whether the facility agrees with Department findings or not, and is the means by which the Department monitors and ensures correction of deficiencies. As long as the facility submits a Plan of Correction, the facility may continue to operate and receive Medicare and Medicaid payment, while deficiencies are being corrected. A Plan of Correction, for purposes of licensure and certification, is not an admission of wrongdoing on the part of the facility.”

As an example, during its most recent inspection in August 2016, The Planned Parenthood of Northeast Philadelphia was recorded with approximately seven non-compliance issues involving medication storage, medical records, fire safety and procedural issues. Plans of correction were completed by October 2016.

Below are links for a few Pennsylvania abortion center inspection surveys.  If you are interested in locating the same type of data for abortion centers in other states, you can start with the Department of Health in your state but it may take some digging to locate the information and is dependent upon your state’s registration and licensing requirements for abortion clinics.

PPSP – Far Northeast Health Center
Philadelphia Women’s Center
Hillcrest Women’s Medical Center-Harrisburg

Guess How Many Abortion Clinics Use the Word 'Abortion' in Their Name

Jackson Women's Health Organization in Jackson, MS

Christian Post

Out of 1,800 abortion clinics in the U.S., including 730 stand-alone mills, how many would you expect to include the word "abortion" in their name?

Try one: the Abortion Surgery Center in Norman, Okla.

On one hand, it's entirely understandable that abortion businesses avoid the word "abortion" like the plague it is. On the other hand, the fact that virtually no clinics identify themselves by what they actually do reveals an awful lot about a truly awful industry.

It also cuts the legs out from under one of the abortion lobby's favorite charades: to fake outrage about the names pregnancy centers use for themselves. Terms that are off-limits to pregnancy centers, so the argument goes, include but are not limited to "choice," "options," "health," and "clinic."

If the abortion lobby had its way, every pregnancy center would bear the name, "Jesus is Antichoice and Demands You Choose Anything But Abortion." Kind of catchy in its own way, isn't it?

On a more serious note, this ludicrous assertion has found its way into state laws in California, Illinois and Hawaii, with lawmakers deducing that since pro-life pregnancy centers don't name themselves according to the proposed standards of abortion special-interest groups, they must be deceptive.

Once again, the abortion industry is entirely unwilling to take its own medicine.

The latest example of this particular anti-pregnancy center trope came Tuesday courtesy of Vice.com. Overviewing the seven states down to just one abortion business, the report quotes Sharon Lewis, the director of West Virginia's last mill.

"We have a neighbor, a crisis pregnancy center, that changed their name to Women's Choice to confuse patients who intend to come here and end up in their doorway," Lewis, said. "They have a marquee out front that says, 'Considering abortion? Free pregnancy test.'"

Lewis' statement obviously went without a quick fact-check from Vice, since the name of the pregnancy center next door is actually "Woman's Choice Pregnancy Resource Center," which has been serving the community since 1977 and located next door to the abortion clinic in 2013.

Without any sense of irony, Lewis — whose abortion business is innocuously called, "Women's Health Center of West Virginia" — goes on to admit that it's actually she and other abortion providers throughout the state who are on a mission to deceive women.

"Until this year there were two facilities in the state that advertised abortion care," Lewis said. "I believe there are private doctors who do certain procedures for friends and family. But they're not called abortions."

"They're not called abortions?" Whatever does she mean?

Christian Post article continues

Planned Parenthood, Abortion Clinics Overbilled Taxpayers by Over $130 Million, Report Finds

By Samuel Smith
Christan Post

The fifth annual report that analyzes how the abortion industry is wasting taxpayer money was released on Wednesday by the law firm Alliance Defending Freedom and the education arm of the pro-life lobbying organization Susan B. Anthony list, Charlotte Lozier Institute.

Titled "Profit. No Matter What," the document highlights findings from available audits of Planned Parenthood affiliates and state family planning programs.

The 2017 report, which is authored by Charlotte Lozier Institute senior fellow Catherine Glen Foster, includes new audits on state family planning programs in California, Texas, and Wisconsin and audits of Planned Parenthood clinics in Ohio, Oklahoma, Nebraska and Wisconsin.

"The Nebraska audit found a Planned Parenthood affiliate spending federal funds on abortion expenses in violation of federal and state law," the report explains, which is a violation of the Hyde Amendment banning medicaid funds from being used for abortions.

"Charlotte Lozier Institute and Alliance Defending Freedom's research strongly suggests that Planned Parenthood and its affiliates are engaged in a pattern of practices designed to maximize their bottom-line revenues through billings to complex, well-funded federal and state programs that are understaffed and rely on the integrity of the provider for program compliance."

Christian Post article continues

AUL Releases UNSAFE, Ground-breaking Report Examining Dangerous Conditions in Abortion Clinics, Calls for Further Investigation

Americans United for Life

WASHINGTON, D.C. (12-12-16) – Following an examination of confirmed reports of dangerous abortion clinic conditions over the last 8 years, Americans United for Life releases a ground-breaking investigative report today: Unsafe: How The Public Health Crisis in America’s Abortion Clinics Endangers Women. 

The analysis details horrific abortion clinic conditions, documenting that 227 abortion providers in 32 states were cited for more than 1,400 health and safety deficiencies between 2008 and 2016 and details hundreds of significant violations of state laws regulating abortion clinics. 

“The Supreme Court wrongly threw out Texas’ health and safety standards, concluding that there was insufficient evidence to support the need for the law. That perceived deficit must be addressed wherever and whenever possible, yet this void exists, in part, because of the scandalously lax manner in which many abortion clinics are monitored,” observed Americans United for Life Vice President of Legal Affairs Denise Burke, the report’s author.

She continued: “AUL took on the task of learning what information is available on abortion clinic conditions and what is not, as too few states protect women by appropriately regulating and inspecting abortion clinics.

The fact that data from some states are not included in the report indicates the need for better and more regular inspections and reporting on the results of those inspections Importantly, AUL is releasing this report in advance of the 2017 state legislative sessions so that lawmakers will have an important tool for explaining the critical need for enhanced health and safety standards and to call for further investigation.”

Top 10 Violations Cited as Unsafe:

1. Failure to ensure a safe and sanitary environment and to follow infection control policies: 130 clinics in 22 states
2. Failure to accurately document patient records and keep patient medical information confidential: 100 clinics in 17 states
3. Failure to ensure staff are properly trained for duties: 82 clinics in 14 states
4. Unlicensed/unqualified/untrained staff providing patient care: 81 clinics in 14 states
5. Expired medications and medical supplies: 77 clinics in 17 states
6. Failure to adopt, follow and/or periodically review internal health and safety protocols: 77 clinics in 15 states
7. Failure to purchase and maintain the required equipment: 74 clinics in 11 states
8. Failure to properly handle medications: 62 clinics in 16 states
9. Failure to comply with physical plant standards: 41 clinics in 6 states
10. Failure to monitor patient vital signs: 30 clinics in 10 states

American United for Life report continues

Blogger's Note: Beginning of report has been edited for brevity. For opening remarks, click on link above.