Amber Nicole Thurman’s death from an infection in 2022 is believed to be the first confirmed maternal fatality linked to post-Roe bans.

Amber Nicole Thurman’s death from an infection in 2022 is believed to be the first confirmed maternal fatality linked to post-Roe bans.

Reproductive justice advocates have been warning for more than two years that the end of Roe v. Wade would lead to surge in maternal mortality among patients denied abortion care—and that the increase was likely to be greatest among low-income women of color. Now, a new report by ProPublica has uncovered the first such verified death. A 28-year-old medical assistant and Black single mother in Georgia died from a severe infection after a hospital delayed a routine medical procedure that had been outlawed under that state’s six-week abortion ban.

Amber Nicole Thurman’s death, in August 2022, was officially deemed “preventable” by a state committee tasked with reviewing pregnancy-related deaths. Thurman’s case is the first time a preventable abortion-related death has come to public attention since the Supreme Court overturned Roe, ProPublica’s Kavitha Surana reported.

Now, “we actually have the substantiated proof of something we already knew—that abortion bans kill people,” said Mini Timmaraju, president of the abortion-rights group Reproductive Freedom for All, during a call with media. “It cannot go on.”

  • AeonFelis@lemmy.worldEnglish
    4·
    1 month ago

    This may be the first confirmed case, but it’s probably not a good idea to make it the poster case for pro-choice. Let’s look at the facts:

    • She was pregnant with twins, and wanted an abortion.
    • She couldn’t legally do it in her home state Georgia, so she had to travel to North Carolina and get abortion pills there.
    • A few days later, when she was already back home, she started to suffer from severe complications.
    • The doctors in Georgia could not legally perform the procedure that could have saved her life - a surgical removal of what remained of the fetus - because it was to close to abortion.

    The article says the clinic in North Carolina could have performed that procedure, but does not state why she was not brought there. Maybe her condition was too bad for the long travel? Maybe she was evacuated to the nearest hospital (a decision which does, generally, make a lot of sense) which could not have signed her away for an illegal (by Georgian law) operation outstate? Maybe it was medically and legally possible to drive/fly her there, but it was too expensive for her? Either way - it is clear that the ban on abortions in Georgia (made possible “thanks” to the Roe vs Wade overruling) is the direct reason why she could not get the treatment which could have save her life.

    BUT!

    The pro-life camp can easily pin this on the abortion pills, claiming that a nation-wide abortion bad would have prevented her from receiving them and therefore would have prevented her death (and the aborted twins’ death. They won’t forget to include that)