NPR: Their fetus had a fatal condition, but they couldn't leave Texas for an abortion

[Morrison71]

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/04/06/1168399423/a-good-friday-funeral-in-texas-baby-halos-parents-had-few-choices-in-post-roe-te

Her name was Halo, and she was born last week, on March 29, two months early and weighing 3 pounds. She lived for four hours, dying in the arms of her father, Luis Villasana.

Her mother, Samantha Casiano, knew their baby wouldn't survive long because she had anencephaly – part of Halo's brain and skull never developed.

Casiano got the diagnosis three days after Christmas, at a prenatal appointment when she was 20 weeks pregnant. "I was told that she's incompatible with life," she says. "I was crushed."

She asked her OB-GYN what her options were. Casiano says her doctor told her, "Well, because of the new law, you don't have any options. You have to go on with your pregnancy."
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Texas has among the strictest abortion laws in the country, with three overlapping bans. One abortion ban predated Roe v. Wade, another was triggered when Roewas overturned and comes with a maximum penalty of life in prison for providing an abortion in Texas. There's also SB-8, which allows people to bring civil charges for "aiding or abetting" an abortion in the state.

Casiano knew that Texas banned abortions, but she didn't think those laws would apply in a situation where the fetus was certain to die. But the laws do apply. A narrow exception allows for abortions when the mother's life or "a major bodily function" is in imminent danger, but there are no exceptions in Texas law for the diagnosis of a fetal anomaly, no matter how severe. In fact, very few states with abortion bans have such exceptions.
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Casiano wishes she could have ended the pregnancy in Texas as soon as she got the anencephaly diagnosis.

"I should have had that choice – that right over my own body and over my daughter's body to be able to tell my daughter, 'It is time for you to rest,' because she was going to end up having to rest anyways," Casiano says.

Casiano also looked into donating the baby's organs. She thought, "Maybe this is why this is happening, because my baby can save another baby," she says. "I was told that anencephaly babies do not qualify to donate their organs. So I was like, 'OK, I don't see a purpose in this.'"
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In the end, her daughter came early, at 33 weeks. Labor was painful, the baby was delivered breech and she needed an epidural. "Some of her brain was not fully developed – when she came out, I was just like, 'Oh my God.' I was just numb."

She says her husband really believed there was a possibility the baby would be OK, but she only lived a few hours. "When she died, it was heartbreaking to him," she says. They each took turns holding her. "Having to see my daughter that way was just so hard."
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Amy O'Donnell, director of communications for the Texas Alliance for Life, calls Casiano's situation "heartbreaking," but says she supports the abortion bans and opposes creating exceptions for fetal anomalies.

"I do believe the Texas laws are working as designed," she says.

Casiano says she won't get pregnant again – she doesn't want to take the chance of reliving this experience. She wanted to have her tubes tied when she delivered last week, but couldn't because of a Medicaid rule that requires a 30-day waiting period after giving birth. She has an intrauterine device for birth control in the meantime.

She's applied for short term disability and is taking leave from work while she recovers physically and emotionally. Her young kids are trying to understand what happened, she says.

 

[The Tradition]

God will take care of it.

 

[Huey Grey]

Rs shit their beds on abortion. You dumbfvcks are going to lose and lose and lose elections until you reverse the bullshit.

 

[FlickShagwell]

Rs shit their beds on abortion. You dumbfvcks are going to lose and lose and lose elections until you reverse the bullshit.

Nah, they’ll just gerrymander states so Dems can’t win and expel the few that do like they did in TN today.

Democracy, baby!

 

[Tom Paris]

Rs shit their beds on abortion. You dumbfvcks are going to lose and lose and lose elections until you reverse the bullshit.

Not in the South.

 

[Tom Paris]

Nah, they’ll just gerrymander states so Dems can’t win and expel the few that do like they did in TN today.

Democracy, baby!

They literally can’t win without cheating.

 

[cigaretteman]

Deplorable. Sadly, we are going to hear about more and more cases like this due to the Republican theocrats.

 

[ft254]

Floridians are petitioning to put abortion rights on a state's initiative. Wouldn't that be something. Another Red state opting to tell the hillbilly racists to fcvk themselves.