Pro-life doctor responds to NPR audio of woman undergoing first-trimester abortion
A pro-life doctor has pushed back against a National Public Radio reporter's comparison of abortion to childbirth and offered her insight after the news outlet broadcast audio of a woman undergoing a first-trimester abortion.
As people in Michigan consider Proposal 3 to enshrine abortion as a constitutional right during the midterms, NPR aired audio Friday from host Kate Wells' reporting inside the Northland Family Planning clinic in Sterling.
After interviewing several abortion-minded women, the NPR reporter joined an unnamed woman as she underwent a surgical abortion at 11 weeks pregnant. A loud vacuum-like sound from the suction machine can be heard during the procedure.
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A staffer named Brandy tells the woman to "Just keep breathing." At one point, the woman can be heard complaining that she can't breathe. After the abortion is complete, Brandy and abortionist Audrey Lance encourage the woman, cheering, "You did it!"
"Most patients are partially awake during the procedures. They get IV medication for pain and anxiety," the reporter said.
"The lights are dimmed, there's soothing music, it actually feels a lot like a childbirth, in a medical gown, your bare legs and stirrups, and a person next to you, saying, 'You can do this.'"
In an analysis of the audio conducted by the pro-life research organization Charlotte Lozier Institute and emailed to The Christian Post, OB-GYN Dr. Ingrid Skop outlined how an abortion procedure differs from childbirth.
Skop serves as CLI's director of medical affairs and has over 25 years of experience as an OB-GYN.
"A sharp-toothed grasping instrument, called a tenaculum, is used to grasp the cervix, providing traction as the abortionist inserts progressively larger metal dilators to stretch open the cervix," Skop, who has delivered more than 5,000 babies, wrote.
"Then, as we heard on NPR, the electric vacuum aspirator is turned on so that the abortionist can suction out the unborn baby."
The doctor refutes Planned Parenthood's description of the procedure as a "gentle suction," citing former abortionist Dr. Anthony Levatino's video breakdown of the procedure.
Levatino, who has conducted over 1,200 abortion procedures, says the electric vacuum aspirator used in a first-trimester surgical abortion has up to "10 to 20 times the suction power of a household vacuum." Skop speculates this is why the mother in the NPR recording can be heard groaning in pain.
Skop said the suction "rips out" the adherent placenta and unborn child. Even after the mother receives pain medication, Skop said a suction that powerful is still likely to hurt.
"Tragically, while the mother's physical pain may be over, there is no guarantee that the emotional pain will subside quickly," she wrote, citing a 2018 study that analyzed a bevy of scientific literature on abortion and its negative impact on women's mental health.
"Surely, our society can offer better solutions to women," the OB-GYN wrote.
Tara Sander Lee, a Harvard-trained scientist who serves as director of life sciences at Charlotte Lozier Institute, pushed back against NPR describing an 11-week-old fetus as "pregnancy tissue." Lee said that by 11 weeks, unborn babies have developed their fingers and toes and display a preference for using "their right or left hand when sucking his thumb."
"By 11 weeks, the baby already had 4,000 distinct anatomical parts, or 90% of the named body parts found in an adult," Lee wrote in a statement. “Science confirms that an unborn baby’s heart is beating rhythmically by 6 weeks. By 11 weeks, the age of the baby aborted in the NPR broadcast, the baby had a heart rate of 168 beats per minute and the heart had already beat over 9 million times."
“By 11 weeks, the baby that NPR describes as ‘pregnancy tissue’ was alive and active," Lee continued. "In fact, scientists have determined that at 11 weeks the unborn baby has brain activity and doesn’t stay still for more than 13 minutes at a time. The phrase ‘pregnancy tissue’ is a cruel exercise in semantics designed to deny or obscure what science knows about the humanity of the baby."
NPR's Wells shared other stories from her investigation in an Oct. 26 article, including a woman named Melissa from Ohio who traveled to Michigan for an abortion. Melissa was a single mother with two kids, working and attending school at the time of the abortion. By the time she had the abortion, the mother was 14 weeks pregnant.
After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade this summer, Ohio enacted a law banning most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. A judge has placed an indefinite hold on the ban. However, the state's attorney general is appealing to reinstate it.
In response to Roe's reversal, Michigan's Proposal 3 intends to enshrine abortion into the state constitution. Critics of the measure have claimed that it could authorize minors to obtain abortions without parental consent or notice and reduce medical regulations surrounding the practice. However, proponents claim the law wouldn't immediately invalidate parental consent laws unless the issue goes to court.
Samantha Kamman is a reporter for The Christian Post. She can be reached at: samantha.kamman@christianpost.com.
