Sue Feaga, writing as a member of Gettysburg Conservatives and a representative of the Tender Care Pregnancy Center has written an opinion piece from a pro-life standpoint.
It should be noted that Tender Care Pregnancy Center is not a licensed healthcare facility, nor is its practice licensed, inspected, or certified by the state of Pennsylvania.
There is no evidence that Ms. Feaga is currently licensed as a nurse, nor as a therapist from the state of Pennsylvania. A Darlene Feaga in Gettysburg, however, let her nursing license expire in 2002. https://www.pals.pa.gov/#!/page/search
Anyone with $1,200 can buy an ultrasound machine from Amazon and show women images of their fetus on a screen. Tender Care is not held to any federal or state standard to ensure their equipment and procedures do not harm women.
Unlike Planned Parenthood offices, which are state-licensed healthcare facilities, Tender Care does not accept health insurance.
Feaga makes egregiously wrong claims about fetuses. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists agrees with peer-reviewed science that fetuses do not feel pain until 24 weeks gestation, which coincides with their definition of viability – the ability to live outside of the womb and the largely-accepted barrier to abortions beyond that fetal age.
Moreover, any licensed pediatrician can explain that the function of lungs, for example, does not happen until birth when a baby can take its first breath, which is also the Biblical definition of Life.
While vividly describing the outcome of a medicated abortion as the basic pain and trial of any miscarriage, of which one in five pregnancies naturally result, Feaga fails to acknowledge the potential harms of the 2022 Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade.
Because miscarriages don’t always expel all fetal tissue, some may begin to rot inside the woman, who then needs a dilation and curettage (D&C) to remove it. Disastrously, where abortion-restrictive states broadly interpret D&C as abortion, medical doctors don’t advocate the procedure, at risk to their licensure, until the mother’s life is on the brink. With a grim increasing frequency, mothers are dying because the life-saving D&C or abortion didn’t come in time. And they are mothers, because sixty percent of people who seek abortion already identify as mothers.
If anyone knows a pregnant person’s circumstances best, it is that person. Whether they are suffering a health condition that is incompatible with pregnancy, an abusive situation, they can’t afford another mouth to feed, or they never want to be pregnant, have a baby, or raise a child, reproductive freedom that includes access to safe and legal abortion, birth control, in vitro fertilization, and gender-affirming care offers them real choices about their lives ahead.
Only when we can create the families we choose are we truly free.
I am not sure what my deceased mother in laws expired nursing license has anything to do with the points you were trying to make Beth except to hope it would discredit statements that I made.
Tender Care does have a nurse on staff who is also a trained sonographer and all ultrasounds are followed up by a licensed physician. Tender Care has encouraged thousands of families in their journey to parenthood through pregnancy testing, ultrasounds, parenting classes, material assistance and post abortive counseling.
And you are correct to say that Tender Care does not charge for their services because most of the clientele cannot afford to pay for them. What exactly was your intent Beth?
WebMD, dated May 3, 2023, states that pain receptors in the growing fetus are developing by 7 weeks and linked to the brain by 12-15 weeks. The Lozier Institute, dated Sept. 13, 2022, states that a fetus may experience pain as early as 12 weeks. We can both back up our statements by science but what is the reality? During an abortion procedure the fetus is sucked away from its life source or pulled apart and dismembered by surgical instruments. Beth, would you like to stand as arbiter as to whether the fetus feels the pain associated with that procedure? I sure wouldn’t. I would rather err on the side of compassion.
God Himself has spoken in His Word as to the “biblical definition of life” in Psalm 139: 13-16 it states He formed you and knit you together in your mother’s womb. Each life is a carefully executed creation by a God who forms individuals in His image.
You and I both know that the news sensationalizes stories and makes broad statements about women dying all because Roe v. Wade was overturned. We’ll not likely ever hear the actual nitty gritty truth because sadly, agendas to some are more important than facts these days. But I will close with this fact – the Guttmacher Institute stated 1,026,700 abortions were performed nationwide in 2023 with those statistics only coming from formal health care systems. So how many babies’ lives were actually taken if that is an undercount? Don’t their lives matter, Beth?
The circumstances of my conception do not determine my worth. Regarding Farnham’s comments about another mouth to feed and only when we create the family we choose are we actually free, would that include killing a male fetus because you wanted a female? Or terminating a Down’s Syndrome child? Ask a woman 10 years after an abortion if she regrets her decision. Then ask a woman who decided to keep a child if she regrets her decision. You may be surprised.