New statistics released by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) show that women who use the abortion pill, RU-486, are in danger. The Family Research Council (FRC) worked this summer to pressure the FDA to release of the latest figures on deaths and serious side effects from the abortion pill. Those records, released in mid-July, show that of the 1.52 million women who used the drug through the end of April 2011, 14 women died, and 2,207 experienced adverse effects. But FRC's Jeanne Monahan says that is probably not all.
"We think that the deaths are probably pretty accurate, because it's hard to get around reporting a death," she notes. "But, it is possible that in terms of the hospitalization, the infections, etcetera, I think even the FDA estimates that only about a tenth of adverse events are actually reported to them."
That includes significant blood loss and infections, some of which are severe and require hospitalization. Also, in many cases, those who dispense the drug do not follow FDA recommendations.
"Planned Parenthood routinely gives out the drug at a much lower dose -- like a third of the dose," Monahan reports. "Another off-label use is using it past the amount of time that the FDA has approved it for. So, they've approved it for 49 days, [but] Planned Parenthood clinics routinely give this up to 63 days of a baby's development. So that becomes problematic."
That means women are in danger. So Monahan wants to remind people that "abortion is a deeply invasive procedure, and that the abortion pill in particular is very hard on women, in some cases resulting in death."
I have written in support of the non heart beating cadaver donor method for procuring organs–sometimes called heart death to differentiate it from the "brain death" (really, declared dead by neurological criteria). This approach involves declaring death after the irreversible cessation of cardio/pulmonary function, usually after the planned withdrawal of mechanically delivered life-sustaining treatment. After a waiting period of 2-5 minutes to ensure no spontaneous resuscitation, the patient is declared dead by the treating team, and the organ harvesting team enters the surgical suite and procurement begins.
Ethically, the treating medical team that withdraws unwanted medical treatment is supposed to be completely divorced from the organ procurement team. And if the patient doesn't go into cardiac arrest within 30 minutes of withdrawing life support, he or she is returned to the ward and is no longer considered a donor.
A key to me in this area was a sufficient waiting period: I have always considered 2 minutes to be too short for comfort, but have been okay with 5 minutes. And certainly, the care for the living patient must be completely separate from the post death organ donation. But now, new proposed rules contemplate doing away with both these ethical protections. From the Washington Post story:
Surgeons retrieving organs for transplant just after a donor's heart stops beating would no longer have to wait at least two minutes to be sure the heart doesn't spontaneously start beating again under new rules being considered by the group that coordinates organ allocation in the United States. The organization is also poised to eliminate what many consider a central bulwark protecting patients in such already controversial cases: an explicit ban on even considering anyone for those donations before doctors and family members have independently decided to stop trying to save them.
What a profoundly unwise idea! Perhaps these organ transplant professionals are so caught up in their important work–that wasn't sarcasm–that they don't understand that the erosion of existing protections will profoundly undermine the people's weak faith in organ transplantation, which to use the old cliche, is a mile wide, but is only an inch deep. In other words, instituting these changes could well result in fewer organs obtained, not more. Indeed, if people come to believe that their organs could come to be considered as more important than their lives, you will see a mass exodus from organ donor lists.
The Susan B. Anthony List has released a catchy, informative video exposing the magnitude of Barack Obama's loyalty to Planned Parenthood in his capacity as president…
SBA List's accompanying website, TurnOffTheMusic.com, shows how President Obama has reciprocated Planned Parenthood's $1.7 million political investment in 2008 and 2010:
During fiscal year 2009, Planned Parenthood reported receiving over $363 million dollars in government grants and contracts – an all-time record – boosting their annual budget to over $1 billion.
In February of 2011, in response to undercover videos by Live Action in which Planned Parenthood employees show a willingness to aid and abet in alleged sex trafficking of minors, Obama called it a "manufactured" issue….
When Speaker Boehner demanded that [a Planned Parenthood] cut be a part of the final Continuing Resolution deal to keep the federal government from shutting down, President Obama refused to cut a dime…. respond[ing], "Nope, zero. Nope, zero. John, this is it."
Now that states are taking the initiative to cut spending, SBA List reports how the Obama administrative is "trying to strong-arm and even bypass [their] decisions":
In June 2011, after [Indiana] Gov. Mitch Daniels signed into law a bill defunding Planned Parenthood, the Obama Administration responded by declaring their law to be "illegal." Furthermore, the Obama Administration told the state that if it did not change the law, Health and Human Services would consider pulling the state's Medicaid funding, which totals $4.3 billion….
After declaring Indiana's law to be illegal, HHS issued a warning to other states stating that they are not permitted to "exclude providers from the program solely on the basis of the range of medical services they provide."
In September 2011, responding to a decision made by the elected members of New Hampshire's Executive Council to reject a $1.8 million dollar contract with Planned Parenthood, the Obama Administration bypassed the state and contracted directly with Planned Parenthood. The non-competitive contract outraged local officials….
It really is breathtaking to see how far Obama has been willing to go to force not only federal taxpayers but state legislatures to continue financially supporting Planned Parenthood.
But this support is only temporal. Obama and Planned Parenthood are merely fighting headwinds.
Peyton Manning, quarterback for the Indianapolis Colts and four-time NFL MVP, apparently went to Europe to get an adult stem cell procedure on his neck, according to a report Sunday by Jay Glazer of Fox Sports. Manning has had three surgeries on his neck in the last 19 months, Little detail was available, but the information indicates that the procedure may have used adipose (fat) derived adult stem cells from Manning's own body; this autologous procedure (using your own adult stem cells) bypasses any problems of transplant rejection and is relatively safe. Manning's adult stem cells may have then been injected around the site of his problem vertebra in the neck, to assist healing and help with spinal disc fusion. In that respect, it sounds similar to the procedure that Texas Gov. Rick Perry received in Houston, Texas, for his back problem.
Glazer indicates in his report that Manning went to Europe for the adult stem cell procedure because it is not yet approved in the U.S. This may be true, since Europe is well ahead of the U.S. in current use of stem cells for actual patient treatments. ALL of those treatments involve adult stem cells, of course.
Glazer's suggestion that only embryonic stem cell treatments are available in the U.S. is inaccurate, however. It's true that the only three approved clinical trials experimenting with embryonic stem cells are in the U.S.; with a total of four patients known to have been injected with the dangerous embryonic stem cells, and no results as yet.
But there are actually over 2,200 FDA-approved adult stem cell clinical trials ongoing or completed, most of which in this list are in the U.S. That includes several adult stem cell trials using adult stem cells for spinal fusion, and even a couple of adipose-derived adult stem cell trials in Indianapolis. Maybe Peyton realized that only adult stem cells had real potential for safe and ethical treatment of patients. Hopefully, he will talk about his experience so more people understand the difference between embryonic and adult stem cells.
A CNN/ORC International poll released Thursday shows that 62 percent of the respondents believe abortion should be made illegal under most or all circumstances.
The telephone poll of 1,038 voters, conducted by ORC between Sept. 9 and 11, covered a broad range of social issues — from terrorism and immigration to gay marriage and the theory of evolution — and carried a margin of error of +/- 3 percent.
According to the results, 41 percent of respondents said abortion should be "legal in a few circumstances," and 21 percent said it should be "illegal in all circumstances"; 25 percent felt it should be "legal under any circumstances," and 12 percent said it should be "legal in most circumstances."
Those numbers have proven consistent over the last five years. In 2006, 2007 and 2009, 40 percent said abortion should be legal some of the time; 39 percent said so in 2008 and 42 percent agreed in 2010. The percentage of those believing it should be banned in all circumstances dropped from 24 percent in 2006 to 22 percent in 2007 and 2008 before rising to 23 percent in 2009. It dropped back to 22 percent in 2010.
"This continues the trend that we've seen over the last several years — the majority of Americans are solidly pro-life," said Dawn McBane, CitizenLink's bioethics analyst. "This perspective also accounts for the passage of a record number of state life-protecting laws this year."
A bit of good news. Congress passed and the president signed a law (the America Invents Act, H.R. 1249) that includes an important, but not well-known, pro-life provision called the Weldon Amendment. The amendment prevents the U.S. Patent and Trade Office (USPTO) from issuing patents that are "directed to or encompassing a human organism."
Translation: no human is an "invention" or property to be licensed for financial gain.
The Weldon language used to be a pro-life "rider" that had to be attached annually to a spending bill. Its inclusion in the America Invents Act means that the ban is now permanent law.
UPDATE: my ever-so-smart colleague Bruce rightly mentioned to me that most people may not understand just what the patenting of human organism actually looks like in practice:
I think Nathanael Bennet over at the ACLJ blog answered your question best:
One of the most important practical effects of this [Weldon] language is that the Patent Office is not able to patent cloned human embryos or human embryos intended for research purposes.
A ban on the issuing of U.S. patents on human embryos was enacted into law today – the culmination of an eight-year effort in which National Right to Life played a key role.
The pro-life policy was enacted as part of a bill called the "America Invents Act" (H.R. 1249). The bill, which runs 58 pages in its final form, makes numerous changes to the laws that govern the granting of patents in the United States, which is a function of the U.S. Patents and Trademarks Office (USPTO), part of the Department of Commerce.
A patent is a government-conferred property right that gives an inventor exclusive rights to manufacture or use his invention for a defined period, usually 20 years. The patent holder can license others to employ his patent for a fee, called a royalty.
Early in the year, when it became clear that Congress was likely to take up sweeping revision of the patent laws, NRLC insisted on inclusion of language to codify (make permanent) a previously enacted temporary prohibition on any patents being issued on human embryos.
Subsequently, the NRLC-backed language was added to the bill, with the support of House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Tx.), House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ), and other key lawmakers. Both the House and Senate subsequently approved the broader bill without separate votes on the NRLC-backed provision. President Obama signed the bill into law today.
The key language, as it appears in Section 33 of the enacted measure, reads as follows: "Notwithstanding any other provision of this title, no patent may issue on a claim directed to or encompassing a human organism."
A similar prohibition was originally proposed by former Congressman Dave Weldon (R-Fl.) in 2003, with the strong support of NRLC, as a amendment to the annual appropriations bill that funds the USPTO. The House adopted the Weldon provision on July 22, 2003. There followed a four-month struggle, in which the powerful Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) lobbied strenuously against enactment of the ban.
NRLC fought hard for the Weldon language, arguing that it was one necessary bulwark against the plans of some biotechnology organizations to create an industry based on the creation and manipulation of human embryos. NRLC and other backers of the Weldon language cited statements by some researchers that they wanted to patent and market human embryos with certain genetic profiles as "models" for studying certain diseases.
Furthermore, in a letter to key members of Congress dated September 11, 2003, then-BIO President Carl B. Feldbaum objected to the Weldon language on grounds that it "would preclude the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) from granting patents on an organism of human species at any stage of development produced by any method [or] a living organism made by human cloning . . ." In a memo, BIO argued that a "genetically modified embryo" should be patentable, since it reflected "human intervention."
NRLC Legislative Director Douglas Johnson said at the time, "The BIO memo and letter fully demonstrated the need for the Weldon Amendment. BIO's theory of patent law would allow patents to protect what President Bush has called 'human embryo farms.'"
Because the Weldon provision was attached to a one-year appropriations bill, it has been necessary to renew it for each subsequent fiscal year. While NRLC and other pro-life forces have been successful in fending off attempts to weaken or repeal the annual bans, the long-term goal – now realized – was to codify the ban into permanent law.
Commenting on enactment of the permanent ban today, NRLC's Douglas Johnson commented, "This law recognizes that human life is not a commodity, and that a member of the human family can never be regarded as a mere invention, or as 'intellectual property.'"
Richard Doerflinger, associate director of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities, commented, "Unethical researchers and biotechnology companies are willing not only to create and destroy embryonic human beings for research purposes, but even to patent these fellow humans so they can license, market, buy, and sell them as mere commodities. By prohibiting patents on human organisms, Congress has helped prevent such gross abuses and has taken some of the profit motive out of the drive for human cloning.'
The substantive scope of the Weldon language was explained by then-USPTO Director James Rogan in a letter dated November 20, 2003, as follows: "The USPTO understands the Weldon Amendment to provide unequivocal congressional backing for the long-standing USPTO policy of refusing to grant any patent containing a claim that encompasses any member of the species Homo sapiens at any stage of development. . . . including a human embryo or human fetus. . . . [which] applies regardless of the manner and mechanism used to bring a human organism into existence (e.g., somatic cell nuclear transfer, in vitro fertilization, parthenogenesis)."
The National Right to Life Communications Department has just posted a new YouTube video in which NRLC President Carol Tobias discusses the lifesaving work of National Right to Life. It is a perfect introduction for new members of the movement who are familiarizing themselves with the work of National Right to Life and the state right-to-life affiliates. You can find the video here: http://nrlc.co/pGMg8X. The link has been posted to both Facebook and Twitter for easier sharing. Please distribute this to your traditional and social networks as widely as possible.
Country music singer Collin Raye to be a new voice for the cognitively impaired and those at risk of euthanasia
Terri Schiavo's Life & Hope Network, a foundation created by her parents and siblings following her death by starvation in 2005, has announced that country music star Collin Raye will serve as their national spokesperson.
"I am truly honored and humbled to be representing those who have no voice and appreciate the opportunity to help families and loved ones who are in similar situations like those of Terri Schiavo," said Raye.
Collin Raye charted 16 #1 hits through the 1990's and his career includes 24 top ten hits. Raye has sold over eight million albums and has been nominated five times as country music's Male Vocalist of the Year. In 2001, he was presented with the Humanitarian of the Year award by country music legend Clint Black.
Bobby Schindler, the executive co-director of the Life & Hope Network and brother of Terri Schiavo is excited to have Collin Raye as their national spokesperson: "With Collin's help, we hope to reach many more families in need of our network of attorneys and doctors who are dedicated to protecting the rights of vulnerable, disabled and elderly persons who are at risk of being denied the medical care that they deserve."
Terri Schiavo was dehydrated and starved to death after her husband won the right in court to remove her feeding tube. In March of 2005, almost 14 days after the tube was removed and all legal options to save her were exhausted by her family, Terri passed away. Since the inception of the Life & Hope Network, over 1,000 families have contacted the group to ask for assistance and the group has brought their message to nine countries, 42 states and 30 universities.
"There has been a growing number of families faced with the same situations as Terri's family in recent years and the number is sure to continue to grow as the passage of Obamacare takes away medical decision from families and doctors and put them into the hands of bureaucrats," said Raye.
"This is about the future of what's going on in this country and how we can help the disabled, the physically and cognitively impaired, and the elderly. Every life is precious," Raye added.
Raye shares his own, personal family experience with end of life issues in the heartbreaking death of his 10-year-old granddaughter, who died last year as a result of an undiagnosed neurological condition.
"As Terri said when she was healthy, where there's life there's hope. In my granddaughter's illness we were blessed to have the support and care of wonderful doctors and healthcare workers. It is my hope to be a voice for those who are suffering and need help obtaining the proper care and medical attention that every one of us deserves regardless of age, creed, color, or cognitive ability," Raye said.
Terri's Life & Hope Network has launched a nationwide effort to establish a "Safe Haven" network where hospitals and nursing homes pledge to never withhold medical care, food, or water from any patient.
"We are thrilled to have someone like Collin Raye become an advocate along side of us to help these families and patients in need. Obamacare puts bureaucrats in charge of life and death decisions, so this battle to defend family rights and life is only just beginning," added Suzanne Schindler, co-executive director of Terri's Life & Hope Network.
Contact: Kristina Hernandez Source: Terri Schiavo Life & Hope Network
Life Dynamics, a group fighting to return full legal protection to unborn children, has conducted an exhaustive study that validates claims made in its documentary that associates Planned Parenthood with the eugenics movement. The documentary, Maafa 21, reveals that abortion and birth control are being used as tools of black genocide. But Life Dynamics founder Mark Crutcher tells OneNewsNow the abortion lobby has issued a report that suggests otherwise.
"So, we spent five months on this research project, and we looked at every zip code in the United States in which there is a Planned Parenthood facility or an independent abortion clinic," Crutcher explains. "We used U.S. Census Bureau figures to establish the racial makeup of those zip codes, and then compared that to the state in which that zip code is located."
And his organization's report, "Racial Targeting and Population Control," proves their argument.
"An incredibly high number of these facilities are located in zip codes that are disproportionately black or Hispanic, and I'm not talking about a little bit disproportionate -- ten or 15 percent. We found zip codes that were 1,800-percent disproportionate, and a ton of them that were 500- to 600- [or] 700-percent disproportionate," the Life Dynamics founder reports.
So, Crutcher concludes that the report undeniably shows that the black and Hispanic communities are targeted by Planned Parenthood, which statistically disproves the "population lobby's" denial.
Tuesday 13, 2011, legislation was announced on the floor of the House of Representatives to restore funding for abstinence-centered education. The Abstinence-Centered Education Reallocation Act of 2011 (H.R. 2874), sponsored by Rep. Randall Hultgren (R-IL), is a bill that will emphasize the sexual risk avoidance message found in abstinence programs.
Valerie Huber, Executive Director of the National Abstinence Education Association (NAEA) based in Washington, D.C., said in a press release, "Since President Obama chose to eliminate all funding for abstinence education, this bill is a welcome sign that sexual risk avoidance can once again be the primary prevention message that youth will receive in classrooms across America."
She continued, urging other Members of Congress to co-sponsor this bill, "NAEA applauds the leadership of Rep. Hultgren who has taken legislative action to support these positive trends in the healthy decisions teens are making … We encourage other Members of Congress to co-sponsor the Abstinence Education Reallocation Act of 2011 and urge the House to quickly approve the federal sex education policy change called for in this bill."
Both Mrs. Huber and Rep. Hultgren noted the healthy trend of fewer youth choosing to have sex. It's time to capitalize on this natural momentum and get behind this movement in a positive direction. Read more about this trend and the studies in the blog, "Healthy Trends: Fewer Youth Choosing to Have Sex."
Rep. Hultgren also wrote a Dear Colleague letter, which you can read here.
Citizens in support of sexual risk avoidance and setting abstinence as the expected standard for sexual behavior among our children should encourage their Members of Congress to co-sponsor Rep. Hultgren's bill, the Abstinence-Centered Education Reallocation Ac t of 2011 (H.R. 2874).
Though it has already been established that none of the funds will be used for abstinence education, recipients of federal funding for healthy marriage initiatives are to be announced in the near future. In announcing the funding opportunity, the Department of Health and Human Services defined teaching abstinence as an "unallowable activity." And according to Valerie Huber of the National Abstinence Education Association (NAEA), "This is the very first time that there was a strict policy against providing any information on abstinence education."
But she points out that scientific studies show that teenage girls who are sexually active before marriage are twice as likely to divorce later in life. Huber decides the anti-abstinence Obama administration is showing its true colors.
"Certainly an administration that prides itself in being evidence-based is kind of tipping their hand that this might be an ideological agenda, rather than something in the best evidence-based benefit for young people," the NAEA executive director concludes.
Those who will be receiving funding, which is part of the bill that President Barack Obama signed late last year, should be announced within the next couple of weeks. But since the HHS announcement, House members have written and signed a letter that outlines their request to change the current policy so that abstinence education will be included.
Ethical stem cell research continues to advance. The University of Wisconsin, Madison–where human ESCs were first derived–has found the IPSCs and ESCs are virtually identical. From the U of W story:
A study released Sunday shows embryonic stem cells and induced pluripotent stem cells are almost identical. Since human IPS cells were first produced from mouse cells in 2006 and from human cells in 2007, it has been thought they were equivalent to embryonic stem cells, which are controversial because they are derived from human embryos. But new research, directed by Josh Coon, a UW-Madison associate professor of chemistry and biomolecular chemistry, shows the proteins in the two types of cells are almost identical...Coon, whose lab did the research in collaboration with Thompson's lab, said there is less than a 1 percent difference in the proteins between one cell type and the other.
As I have stated in the past, I think President Bush's funding policy had at least an indirect influence on the development of ethical "alternatives" to ESCR. Moreover, the continuing advances in IPSC research seem to show that we can have our ethics and pluritpotent stem cells too.
My view as a layman who pays close attention to this field, is that IPSCs will be best used in drug testing and cell line experimentation on diseased tissues that were tailor made from specific patients–what we were once told would require human cloning to achieve. I also think adult stem cells will provide most of the clinical benefits for this field. I could be wrong. But unless they find a cure for the tumor threat, IPSCs will be constrained in medical uses just as embryonic stem cells have proven to be.
Yes, there are potential ethical problems with IPSC–not because of what they are, but how they could be used. For example, they could be used in a form of cloning. They could also be used to make viable gametes, that could be used in an inappropriate matter. For example, if a skin cell could be reprogrammed into a human egg, the "egg dearth" problem for human cloning would be solved (one egg is needed for each cloning try) permitting the Brave New Worlders to get to work. But the way to handle that is to regulate the field so these ethically derived cells are not used unethically. For example, now would be a splendid time to outlaw all human cloning research, while most of the horses are still in the barn.
Ramona Trevino has a compelling story to tell about her exodus from the nation's largest abortion provider. But in her first public appearance, she chose to emphasize what God accomplished through a vigil outside the clinic she used to manage.
"My message is to glorify God, and to glorify what wonderful things all of you are doing and continue to do. I'm so excited, and honored, to hopefully be a part of that," she told 40 Days for Life participants at a recent event outside the defunct Planned Parenthood facility in Sherman, Texas.
"People like me everywhere are waiting for a miracle. And that is indeed what happened … Three months later, this place is out of business."
Trevino, its former manager, had already taken a "leap of faith" on May 6, "leaving behind my job … half of my family's income." It meant "having to worry about how we were going to survive, and pay the mortgage, and put food on the table."
She told the assembled members of 40 Days for Life that there had been "a tugging in my heart, on and off, during the three years that I was managing. And it was a tugging that it shames me to say, I did ignore."
Although Trevino's clinic did not perform abortions, she "still had a hand in the referrals. I still had to give out the number, I still had to give out the information on the locations … where they could get an abortion."
"That's a truth I finally had to face. And that was a truth that would be brought to light due to the wonderful 40 Days for Life vigil that was held out here."
In an interview with CNA, Trevino gave more details of her story, explaining how she tried to reconcile her Catholic faith with her work at Planned Parenthood. She also described the dramatic change of heart that coincided with the beatification of Pope John Paul II.
"I was raised Catholic, but I didn't really have a lot of formation in my faith as a kid," said Trevino. "When I was a little girl … I felt like I was being called to the religious life." But she "didn't have the formation, as a young child, to elaborate on that calling."
Instead of becoming a nun, Trevino became pregnant in high school. She left school, and was in a non-Catholic marriage for eight years.
Two years after her subsequent marriage within the Church, Trevino learned about a part-time position at Planned Parenthood from a coworker at her former government job. She had gone through more extensive Catholic formation to prepare for marriage, but still lacked a proper understanding of issues surrounding sexuality and human life.
"I think there was still a lot about my faith that I didn't know – that I didn't get," she recalled.
Trevino, who says she was "always pro-life," also lacked an understanding of Planned Parenthood's leading role in the abortion industry. She associated the organization mostly with contraception, which she regarded as wrong for Catholics, but not for others.
"It didn't take me long before I became uncomfortable working there," she remembered. "It was probably within the first three or four months. The thing that struck me hard was when I had to do my first referral for an abortion."
"We provided pregnancy tests. So a lot of women would come in to confirm pregnancy, and if they were pregnant sometimes they would want an abortion. And we would have to counsel them on the information, the referrals, how far along they were, and that type of thing."
"I remember the very first time I had to do that. I went into my office, I closed the door, and I cried. I guess it was something that I didn't think I was actually going to have to do. I was naïve, and I was too focused on the opportunity of being a manager."
The referrals came relatively infrequently in the small Texas town, and other staff sometimes handled them. When they did occur, Trevino found ways to soothe her conscience.
"I would say prayers for them, and I would justify my actions all the time. I'd come home a wreck, and ask my husband 'Am I guilty?' And I would talk myself out of it, to justify it: 'Really, I'm not making the decision for her; when she walks out the door or gets off the phone, it's up to her what she does. I really am not responsible for what she chooses.''"
"I would constantly try to feed myself lies," she said. "Eventually it got to me. I wasn't standing up for those babies. I wasn't trying to save their lives … Over time, I couldn't deny it to myself anymore."
Trevino also became disillusioned with policies she said were geared toward "pushing things on people" for financial gain. "It's about making money. You didn't get the sense that they really, truly cared about these women they way they say they did."
But the clinic manager's decision to leave Planned Parenthood and its practices behind, is mysterious even to her.
"I can't explain it on a human level. To me, it's all divine."
The point when she says "everything began to change" was December 2010. She tuned in to her local Catholic radio station for the first time, and heard a show on women's post-abortion experiences. Almost every caller spoke of having an abortion through Planned Parenthood. She also learned about "the workings of contraception," and its ability to cause an abortion.
"I began to tune in every day," she said. She learned about Abby Johnson, the former Planned Parenthood employee who chronicled her pro-life conversion in the bestselling book "UnPlanned."
One night, coming back from the clinic, "I was listening to Catholic radio … I remember a woman saying: 'One day, when we die and we meet our maker, he's going to ask: "What did you do to prevent and stop abortion?"' Right there, it was like a dagger in my heart."
She began praying the Rosary during Lent, and said that on the third day, "the blinders just completely came off my eyes." She dropped her excuses about working at a non-abortion-facility, and "understood why working for Planned Parenthood was wrong."
"Shortly after, the first 40 Days for Life vigil was held outside the clinic. I got the courage to go out and talk to them, and ask for their prayers." Trevino says she felt the strength God gave her through the prayers of the pro-life volunteers.
And it's possible that another intercessor, whom the Church celebrated just after Easter, may have been offering his prayers as she neared her decision.
"It was on Divine Mercy Sunday, the day that Blessed Pope John Paul II was beatified … At that time, I said I was probably going to leave Planned Parenthood in June. But I remember, on Divine Mercy Sunday … I just couldn't control my tears. Because at that moment I just felt God calling me."
"I just took that leap of faith, and trusted God, and said: 'I'm out. I'm done.'"
Trevino, who hopes to pursue a pro-life ministry in the future, will give a keynote speech in Dallas on Sept. 27 as 40 Days for Life begins its fall campaign.
An Illinois appeals court has ruled a Planned Parenthood clinic was not obligated to tell a woman who later regretted her abortion that the procedure would take the life of a human being.
The woman, identified in the case as Mary Doe, had an abortion in 2004 at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Chicago. She later filed suit against the clinic, alleging wrongful death of her unborn child, intentional infliction of emotional distress and malpractice, according to the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin.
Doe asked a Planned Parenthood counselor before the procedure if the abortion would end the life of a human being, and the clinic staff member said it would not. She said she would not have gone through with the abortion had the clinic told her the procedure would end a human being's life, according to the news report.
The First District Appellate Court affirmed Aug. 22 a lower court decision dismissing the suit.
"No court, regardless of where it sits, has found a common law duty requiring doctors to tell their pregnant patients that aborting an embryo, or fetus, is the killing of an existing human being," Justice Rodolfo Garcia wrote in the court's opinion, the Daily Law Bulletin reported.
"The negative answer from the Planned Parenthood counselor to the plaintiff's question of whether 'there was already a human being in existence' during the plaintiff's intake evaluation simply reflects the opinion of Planned Parenthood on when life begins," Garcia wrote.
"It was clear that she knew and signed a consent form that 'I know I'm here for an abortion,'" Garcia added. "She knew there was going to be a termination of pregnancy and that she would not have a child."
New Jersey lawyer Harold Cassidy, who argued a similar case in his home state and helped represent Doe, said, "This is a woman's rights case. This is the right of a woman to make a decision herself and get all the information she needs and apply her own discreet, moral or philosophical beliefs as they exist.
"What has happened here is Planned Parenthood replaced her judgment with theirs by denying her the scientific facts and giving her their philosophical viewpoints," Cassidy said, according to the report. "And the court is saying that at Planned Parenthood, she should expect nothing more than getting their philosophical point of view."
Cassidy said he will appeal to the state Supreme Court, the Daily Law Bulletin reported.
Students for Life of America has introduced its newest project, the Pregnant on Campus Initiative, as a response to the stunning statistic that over 46% of abortions in America are performed on college-aged women. When faced with an unintended or crisis pregnancy, many students feel forced to choose between continuing their education or raising their child. Too often, college campuses do not provide the necessary resources or environment that support pregnant and parenting students.
The Pregnant on Campus Initiative aims to address this issue by helping campus pro-life groups to create effective and lasting change on their campus. We encourage and challenge pro-life groups to address this issue on their campus by engaging in service activities geared to providing necessary resources to pregnant and parenting students.
Whether the project involves creating a campus support group or installing diaper decks in bathrooms, establishing an Assistance Fund for pregnant and parenting students, or securing affordable housing on campus, our goal is to increase the amount of pregnancy-friendly resources on college campuses in order to eliminate the pressure to discontinue school from pregnant and parenting students.
Women who have undergone an abortion have an 81 percent higher risk for mental health problems and are more likely to attempt suicide, abuse alcohol and suffer depression, according to a study in a mainstream British journal that is getting considerable attention from both sides of the abortion debate.
The meta-analysis in the latest edition of the British Journal of Psychiatry examined 22 studies from 1995-2009 involving 877,000 women, including 163,000 who had experienced an abortion.
The paper's author, Priscilla K. Coleman of Bowling Green State University, said there actually are "hundreds of studies" showing a link between abortion and serious mental health risks, and that three recent studies that reached a very different conclusion had major flaws. One of those studies by an American Psychological Association task force received significant media attention and concluded there were no risks.
But Coleman said her analysis shows that abortion "is associated with moderate to highly increased risks of psychological problems."
"[T]here are in fact some real risks associated with abortion that should be shared with women as they are counselled prior to an abortion decision," Coleman writes in her paper before chiding the research community for not conducting unbiased research. "... The responsibility therefore rests initially within the research community to set aside personal ideological commitments, objectively examine all high-quality published data, and conduct analyses of the literature that are based on state-of-the-art data analysis procedures...."
The issue of abortion and mental health problems, she wrote, too often is "shrouded in political controversy" and "has not received the scholarly attention it deserves."
The fact that the study was published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, one of the world's leading psychiatric journals, is important, those who monitor the abortion debate say.
"Its appearance in a top psychiatry journal indicates that it was carefully critiqued and evaluated by respected public-health scholars," Michael J. New, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Michigan-Dearborn, wrote at NationalReview.com. "... Hopefully, the prestige of the journal, the volume of studies included, and the consistency of the findings will encourage the mainstream media to give a second look to this important issue."
Coleman's study "offers the largest available body of evidence on the psychological impact of abortion," New said.
Jeanne Monahan, director of the Family Research Council's Center for Human Dignity, said the study "reveals the indisputable truth that abortion is bad for women's mental health." FRC is a pro-life group.
"With this information, doctors now have a valid and unbiased synthesis of the current research available on the relationship between abortion and women's mental health," Monahan said in a statement. "Because it is a meta-analysis, the research is much more thorough and reliable than any other single study or review to date."
A study released in the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology suggests 97 percent of doctors have encountered someone who sought an abortion, but that only 14 percent were willing to do so.
That may seem to be a promising figure, says Dr. Sandy Christiansen of the Christian Medical & Dental Association. But she concludes that the research does not tell the whole story. "The study only looked at OB/GYN physicians -- it didn't look at family practitioners. And the study did not make a distinction between medical and surgical [abortions], and I think that's a critical point," she says. There are no numbers on the use of the abortion drug, RU486, including in telemed abortions where a doctor is not directly involved in administration of the drugs.
Without being able to tap into those figures, Christiansen says she wonders about the true results of the study, especially because of studies revealing that the younger doctors are, the more willing they are to do abortions.
"The 26 to 35 year olds, if you think about it, these are the ones who grew up since Roe v Wade and that's all they've known ... so they need to be shown a different way -- a better way," she states.
It is Christiansen's hope that the pro-life movement will begin to have a heavy impact on the decisions from that group of physicians to reflect more of a pro-life attitude among doctors in the future.
Planned Parenthood's webcam abortion expansion campaign has been stopped in Nebraska by quick-thinking legislators.
Nebraska lawmakers passed a law banning abortions in which a patient communicates via webcam with an abortionist, who may be in another town or city. Simply put, the doctor asks the patient a few questions and then presses a button, which activates a drawer that opens and provides RU-486.
Julie AlbinJulie Schmit Albin of Nebraska Right to Life talks about the law, which has now gone into effect. "Planned Parenthood of the Heartland announced this last spring that they wanted to expand to six new college towns, and so for that reason -- with their announcement of expansion -- we thought it was a very real threat that they would try to take webcam chemical abortions to those cities," she says.
Planned Parenthood uses the telemed abortion method in Iowa and reportedly had plans to spread elsewhere. But Albin says Nebraska took quick action to stop it with legislation that could be a model for other states.
"I think that this is the way that Planned Parenthood is going, and so every state should look at stopping webcam abortions," adds Albin.
RU-486 has proven to have dangerous side effects, including excessive bleeding and -- because it is self-administered -- women having no medical help readily available in case of an emergency.
