HHS head acts to protect born-alive infants; abortion clinic lets survivor die

WASHINGTON — The new head of the Department of Health and Human Services has signaled he is serious about preventing live-birth abortions.

HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt announced April 22 the department had acted to strengthen compliance with the Born-alive Infants Protection Act, a 2002 law that provides legal protection to fully delivered babies, even when they are intended to be aborted.

The law clarifies a newborn child fully outside his mother’s womb is a person to be protected under federal law. This includes every human infant “born alive at any state of development,” according to the law.

The measure especially targeted an abortion method in which newborns who survive are allowed to die. Nurses had testified before a congressional committee that the procedure, known as live-birth abortion, was used at Christ Hospital in Chicago. In the method, delivery is induced, and the baby is left unattended to die.

In a written statement, Leavitt said he would “vigorously uphold” the principle in the Born-alive Infants Protection Act that all infants who are born alive “are entitled to the full protection of the law.”

“We took the first of these educational steps today by notifying relevant entities that we aggressively enforce federal laws that protect born-alive infants,” Leavitt said. HHS “issued clear guidance that withholding medical care from an infant born alive” may be considered a violation of federal law and the conditions for participating in Medicare, he said.

Leavitt’s action “provided reason to be encouraged” following “nearly three years of inaction by the former secretary [Tommy Thompson],” Family Research Council President Tony Perkins said in a written statement. “With the leadership of [Secretary] Leavitt, HHS can enforce basic protections for the most vulnerable and stop this barbaric practice. This is a hopeful sign that the new secretary will work to protect the dignity of all life.”

Victim of Choice
A tiny baby boy died in his mother’s arms in an Orlando, Fla., abortion clinic April 2, the victim not only of her choice but of the unwillingness of the staff to help him, according to a legal organization representing the mother.

Almost 23 weeks pregnant, Angele, a single mother with two children, went to the EPOC Clinic in Orlando April 1 to begin the abortion process, Liberty Counsel reported. Laminaria were inserted in her cervix to begin dilation, and she took a prescription the next day to initiate labor to eject what would supposedly be a dead child. Angele returned to the clinic and gave birth to what appeared to be a healthy boy, whom she named Rowan, according to Liberty Counsel.

She screamed for help and for a clinic worker to call 911, but no one assisted her. Eventually, she retrieved her cell phone, but medical aid failed to arrive before her son died. “I could not stop crying,” Angele said, according to Liberty Counsel. “I felt so bad. I felt so helpless. I had been so wrong to come here. ... I wanted to fix and change everything once I saw Rowan’s precious little face and body. All we needed was someone to get us to safety.”

Liberty Counsel President Mat Staver said, “When I visited baby Rowan at the funeral home and saw his precious little body, fully formed with blond eyelashes and growing fingernails, I wondered, ‘How can we continue to kill our children and hide behind the rubric of choice?’ Rowan’s short life will not be in vain if his story can give life and hope to mothers who believe their only choice is abortion.”

Baptist Press News
Published by Keener Communications Group, May 2005

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