“Elective” abortions (for want of a better word) are available at private clinics with GA or twilight sleep, are relatively inexpensive, and there are clinics who will not turn anyone away based on inability to pay.

*thanks voters fervently for Australian socialised medicine*

*hopes other countries will get their acts together very very soon for all women’s sakes*

Re pregnancy and risk to women:
When I went on birth control pills as a teenager, I read the entire information insert because I’d heard about the big scary risks involved with hormonal birth control, like blood clots and strokes and whatnot. Imagine my surprise when I saw that until the age of (if memory serves) 30-something, the risk of death from pregnancy and birth was significantly higher than the risk of death from birth control.

The sex ed in my school was pretty good, but this whole You Could Still Die In Childbirth IN THIS DAY AND AGE idea was pretty shocking to me at the time.

You’d think if the fundies were so tenderly concerned with the health and wellbeing of women, they’d be much bigger fans of birth control, wouldn’t you?

There are far greater physical risks to the woman in carrying a pregnancy to term and delivering a baby. Proof, if proof were needed, that this is not about women’s welfare.

akeeyu, I’m really sorry to hear your story. Unfortunately I’m sure you’re not alone – and that many women in your position cannot afford to pay up. Ugh.

Your point about the equivalence of foetus and woman is spot on. Andrea Dworkin wrote of anti-choice women that “Female selflessness expresses itself in the conviction that a fertilized egg surpasses an adult female in the authenticity of its existence.” It’s a line that has always stayed with me.

Because of what’s NOT up for debate, because it’s a certainty: Women DO feel pain. Duh. So they’re pitting something that MIGHT feel pain against someone who definitely DOES feel pain, and their concern is with the fetus? Man, that always scores a big “Fuck you” from me.

Incidentally, the flip side of the abortion/ unnecessary anesthesia argument is that some women WANT anesthesia for reasons that have nothing to do with the fetus, and can’t get it or afford it.

I had what the medical community calls a ‘missed abortion’, which essentially means that I was pregnant, the embryo died, and my body didn’t notice. I was given the option to miscarry spontaneously, use the pills to stimulate a miscarriage, or have a D&C. My insurance company wouldn’t cover or even offer general anesthesia for a D&C (although they do offer it for significantly less invasive procedures), so my husband and I paid out of pocket for the entire procedure elsewhere, including the anesthesia.

In my case, the embryo was already dead, so I certainly wasn’t worried about its ability to feel pain, but after trying for quite some time to get pregnant and being told “I’m sorry, that heartbeat we saw before isn’t there anymore,” I absolutely could not hack being awake for the D&C, nor could I stand any more pain.

A D&C is not a painless procedure, so my insurance company’s indifference has always rubbed me the wrong way. Is their theory that women who have to have D&Cs for incomplete abortions aren’t in enough distress already, or is it just that the pain levels of women who choose elective abortions doesn’t particularly trouble them?

Either way, it pisses me off.

Agreed. The problem is that antis claim that fetuses can feel pain quite sooner than viability. As I understand it, many women actually do request anesthesia for pre-viability fetuses due to this misinformation, which not only costs more but also causes an additional risk to the woman.

Even if it is based in fact, however, it’s trivially solvable by offering general anaesthetic for post-semiarbitrary-date abortions (somewhere in the late second trimester), if they involve a significant fetal incision. Same as for open fetal surgery. Anaesthetic gases cross membranes readily; if the woman is out, so is the fetus. Gaseous anaesthesia can be supplemented by the direct administration of opioids to the fetus if it seems medically advisable.

It’s not as though it would change everything overnight if we suddenly encountered incontrovertible evidence that post-24-week fetuses can feel pain. Women don’t trip off blithely for post-viability abortions on a whim; they’re almost always done for serious maternal or fetal medical issues.