Missouri Republicans want to designate a woman who gets an abortion as a murderer, with her physician as an accomplice. As a result I think OB/GYN physicians will be leaving Missouri in droves, just as they are doing in other Republican controlled states, further exacerbating the already serious division of America into two quite different countries in a single nation. Within a few years it is going to become very difficult for a pregnant woman, or a woman with some kind of gynecological disorder, to get high quality healthcare. I also think we are going to see a number of young people leave these Red states, and the medical schools in those states to be profoundly affected.
Abortion-rights supporters take part in a protest in St. Louis. Some Republican state lawmakers have proposed a measure that would allow women who have abortions to be charged with homicide. Credit: Jeff Roberson / AP
JEFFERSON CITY, MISSOURI — Some Missouri lawmakers are renewing a call for the state to take an anti-abortion step that goes further than prominent anti-abortion groups want to go and that has not gained much traction in any state so far: a law that would allow homicide charges against women who obtain abortions.
Republicans in both the state House and Senate have introduced bills to be considered in the legislative session that begins next month to apply homicide laws on behalf of a victim who is an “unborn child at every stage of development.”
The bills would offer exceptions if the suspect is a woman who aborts a pregnancy after being coerced or threatened, or an abortion is provided by a physician to save the life of the pregnant woman.
