Lame-Duck House to Vote on Abortion Anesthesia Bill

[nickshepDEM]

Washington Post:

In a parting gesture by social conservatives before Republicans relinquish control, House leaders plan to bring up a bill tomorrow that would declare that fetuses feel pain and require abortion providers to offer pregnant patients anesthesia for their unborn child.

The scheduled vote may be the last on abortion-related legislation for years. That's because Democratic leaders hope to avoid confrontations over hot-button social issues that divide their caucus, and focus instead on military and pocketbook issues.

<snip>

Democrats are shying from the fight. House Democratic leaders have declared tomorrow's decision "a vote of conscience" and will not try to sway the outcome. House Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) does not plan to speak on the bill, a rarity for her.

The fetal pain bill is coming up nearly as an afterthought, in the final week of a lame-duck session of Congress. House Republican leaders are using expedited procedures to bring it to a vote, meaning it will take a two-thirds vote of the House to pass. Its supporters are setting expectations low.

[sam sarrha]

1. is this a trick to redefine a blastula a fetus..?? to stop stem cell research..?? would anestesia

destroy the stem cell process..??

[Hippo_Tron]

2. Don't care too much about the anesthesia part, but how do they know the fetus feels pain?

[Zodiak]

3. Put simply...They don't

Depends on where one is in development. First trimester....I hardly think that there is enough there for pain (which is a higher brain function).

But then again, that is how the Republicans operate...they start the debate with a false premise that "sounds good" in order to put their opponents at a disadvantage. They do this with all kinds of science.

This bill will give anaesthesiologist more to do, but I hardly think it will reduce human suffering one iota.

Typical Republican grandstanding on a nothing issue.

[usregimechange]

4. I would vote "present."

[liberal N proud]

5. If they pass this bill, it will establish in peoples minds that the fetus can indeed feel pain

It will not matter if it is true, it will provide for them a window of opportunity to say that it has been established that the fetus does feel pain and the next step will conclude it is life.

[Warpy]

6. Supporting this bill displays astonishing ignorance.

In order to feel pain, one must have adequate brain structure to recieive and INTERPRET the signals as pain. This does not occur until the LAST TWO MONTHS of gestation.

This bill is just one more medically ignorant, politically arrogant move by ANTICHOICE MEN to drive up the cost of both chemical and surgical abortion and to push another hardship on women who will now need to be accompanied by someone to and from the clinic.

Politicians should NEVER ATTEMPT TO PRACTICE MEDICINE. They're very, very bad at it.

[elehhhhna]

7. And how does the administration of Anesthesia to a fetus actually work?

I'll bet it can potentially have a neg effect on the woman.

[elehhhhna]

8. The bill demands that Doctors provide "material misinformation", aka, commit malpractice:

...

If one finds persuasive the findings negating fetal pain in the first two trimesters of pregnancy, JAMA's announcement has obvious implications for the Fetal Pain Awareness Act. If the fetus does not experience pain prior to 28 weeks gestation, it would plainly be improper for the law to require health care providers to tell their abortion patients otherwise.

Providing material misinformation to patients considering a procedure is medical malpractice, and the law has no business demanding such malpractice of the nation's physicians. (Sadly, even without a federal mandate, there is plenty of medical malpractice to go around). Offering fetal anesthesia to such women would be equally inappropriate, for similar reasons, as it could expose patients to unnecessary risks with no benefit to anyone.

http://writ.news.findlaw.com/colb/20050907.html

[Warpy]

10. They don't know and they don't care

All they want to do is drive the cost up and put additional barriers in front of women.

There is no way to anesthetize a fetus (that can't feel pain, anyway) without anesthetizing the woman. Even jabbing a needle through the cervix and into the embryo (incredibly, hideously risky) would result in whatever they used to cross the placenta into the woman's bloodstream.

I hate politicians who try to practice medicine. There is nothing more useless in the universe.

[Sapere aude]

9. This will force clinics to have another specialist there and that could

prevent the abortions from happening because the specialists are hard to find and hard to pay for. At the clinic I work for (not an abortion clinic) we are paying a Dr $1400 to come here today.

[Warpy]

11. I'm an ordinary floor nurse and I got certified to administer

conscious sedation anesthesia. My guess is that is what would be used, although I'm sure the fine Christians who are pushing this bill envision a surgical suite and inhaled anesthesia for a 10 minute minor surgery, adding at least a thousand dollars to the cost.