I feel for them, but people are going to have to be extra careful with this going forward.
Don't tell anyone. Don't talk to anyone about it. No text. No paper trail. Nothing. Don't even tell friends you think you could trust.
I have a friend I have known since HS who is anti choice and I would never trust her with this information. Her and her family are anti choice Catholics and would turn people in in a heartbeat.
Trust no one if you're in this situation.
It's why the USA needs federally legislated protection that the Supreme Court will let stand, probably something like the EU has. Despite what Alito put in his opinion on Roe, that court has not ruled on federal legislation regarding abortion because the USA still lacks such legislation.
Meanwhile the state laws that represent complete bans, or stuff like the fetal heartbeat laws --locking people up if they would elect an abortion but fail to seek and obtain it before they even realize they may need one-- are sheer insanity, leaving aside all the misogyny and the red state legislators' disdain for human circumstance and medical necessities as well.
But let's talk about medical necessities for a moment. The potential for brain drain of physicians from those states is a real one. The draconian new anti-abortion laws imperil their right to continue practice of medicine. ER doctors have their own specialty, but that does include knowing how to complete surgically a pregnancy termination if a woman presents with an ectopic pregancy, or comes in after or while miscarrying, for instance. Now the doctor faces criminal investigation of whether the woman self-aborted and the doctor became an instrument of collaboration?
And let's remember there has been at least one state, Ohio, whose legislature
proposed a bill with provision that it be criminal for a doctor not to try to implant an ectopic pregnancy into the womb. This procedure as related to humans is still in the realm of science fiction, and the woman's life at definite risk if treatment of an ectopic pregnancy --which treatment invariably involves loss of the embryo-- is delayed, even if the fallopian tube has not yet ruptured. But there was the collective mind of the Ohio legislature on a matter of law and order in matters medical, insisting that doctors attempt "if applicable" to reimplant an ectopic pregnancy. And here (from the piece cited above) is the related opinion of a couple of doctors:
Receiving a diagnosis of ectopic pregnancy [the chance is usually about 1% but for a woman with a previous ectopic pregancy rises to about 15%] is already tumultuous for women. Ob/Gyns like Drs. Rao and Zanotti are concerned that by allowing language like this in a bill, women may second guess the advice of their physicians. “Delaying treatment of ectopic pregnancy can be catastrophic,” says Dr. Zanotti. “Furthermore, the language in the bill may compound feelings of guilt and shame in women.”
“When we confirm ectopic pregnancy through ultrasound and labs, most women are devastated to learn that there is no way for the pregnancy to be viable. It’s not a casual conversation,” Dr. Rao says.
What sane physician signs up for work in a state where criminal prosecution chances are heightened for performing a medical procedure in all competence and with safe outcome for the patient? Every state in the union is short of competent physicians. Every state in the union has nice places for a physician to live and shop and raise a family.
Who imagines for a moment that prospective medical students won't take stuff like draconian anti-abortion laws into account when planning their med school applications, internships, residencies... ?
