In reading on Dr. Tiller's death, a good and compassionate man murdered by a zealot, I wonder if these forced pregnancy people have any kind of empathy at all. Birth defects and fetal deaths are not uncommon, even in this day and age. Miscarriages aren't rare either, come to think of it. I really wonder what these people think...on second thought, no, no I don't. I wouldn't want to be in their soulless minds, picking on strangers to make themselves feel better, faking compassion and concern trolling abortion clinics so that they can prop up their fragile egos for a few more minutes.
People can think that abortion is murder. That is their opinion; they are entitled to their own opinions on things, though they may disagree with me. We will just agree to disagree. People can even be uncomfortable with the idea of abortion. What cannot be done, however, is curtail the rights of other people to obtain legal medical care. If we go down that road, there is nothing to stop your doctor from not treating you because you're overweight or obese, smoke, eat an occasional hamburger, or drink. Had a heart attack? Well, you rarely exercised and your primary care physician recommended it, so why should you get that bypass surgery or angioplasty? You should have thought of that before it became serious enough that you had the heart attack. Oh? You haven't had a check up in years? Well, tough for you. Maybe your doctor could have warned you that your blood pressure and cholesterol were high. Didn't think of that, now did you? Well, if you don't die, then you're just going to have to live with the consequences. Too late for you now.
And it's not just that part of it. The other part is medical costs. Abortion costs far less than pregnancy and delivery, in terms of medical care, even at later stages. And if we talk about high risk pregnancy, and throw in a very ill baby, then the costs can be huge. Let's say that abortion is outlawed. It's not cheap to keep a premature baby alive. And many, many things can go wrong during a pregnancy. What if the mother has a complication of pregnancy that led to a stroke and she's still carrying the child? They have to keep her on life support in the hospital. But then they notice something wrong with the baby and they have to do an emergency c-section...and the baby is premature. And they have the baby on life support as well, because the child is alive but just barely. If you think that all of this medical care for both mother and child is cheap, you're delusional. Oh, maybe they have insurance, even just catastrophic coverage, and with this scenario, they've pretty much blown through their deductible (if they had one) if not on the first day then at least in the first few days. And what happens if they don't have insurance and can't pay? If mother and child are in the hospital for a month, I'd expect that the claims for it would be very high. One high claim will not necessarily hurt a large group. But we are talking about forcing all women to go through complications (leaving out the emotional turmoil of fathers for a moment), regardless of insurance or ability to pay. If you have several women, even in a small group plan, and this happens every few years or so, the premiums will be astronomical. Actuaries calculate premiums based on the likelihood of particular diseases in classes of individuals/groups; one claim may not affect premiums greatly but repeated claims will. And that's not even counting the struggle that dad has - both baby and wife are confined to the hospital, and that's really heartbreaking. Worse, even if they live, they now have a lot of medical bills to pay, not just the hospitalization but also follow-up appointments, surgeries, durable medical equipment that may be needed (like oxygen tanks or monitors).
I may be a liberal but I'm not heartless bastard. Oh, yes, it's a tragic situation, but it would also cost more than angioplasty. Now, if the woman in question had aborted the child when it was necessary (even if the child is wanted and it's late in the trimester), if the doctor and the patient came to this very hard decision, the woman would not have the stroke and be hospitalized, dad would not have to go through the possibility of losing everyone he loved, and the expenses to them would be less. The insurance may not pick up all of the costs but remember - claims totaling $1 million are different than claims totaling $6000, especially for smaller groups.
The thing is, forced birthers don't care. They don't care about costs, they don't care about lives, they don't care about suffering, they just don't care. They have no knowledge of how anything works - medical care, pregnancy, insurance, compassion - and they think that they're morally superior. Which is the other thing that gets me angry about the forced birthers...
Dr. Tiller was murdered in church. A man who was compelled to help women in the most difficult time of their lives, a man of compassion and dignity, murdered in a house of worship. A person who went to work every single day knowing it could be his last day on earth, all because he felt it necessary to provide the best care he could to expectant parents facing such a tragedy. And he was killed in church. In my opinion, Dr. Tiller was more of a Christian than his murderer.
Forced birthers don't even care about their own religion. Their bible must be pretty thin, what with leaving out the words of the Jesus.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment