The Texas Senate gave initial approval Monday to a bill to protect newborns who survive abortions from infanticide.
State Senate Bill 23 passed in a 20-10 vote with most Democrats voting against it, Fox News reports. A final vote is expected Tuesday.
State Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, acknowledged that abortion survivors are rare, but she said the state still has a duty to protect them.
“If it’s one life — one life out of a million, it’s worth saving,” she said, according to the American-Statesman.
Several Democrats argued that the bill is not necessary, because the state prohibits abortions after 20 weeks and unborn babies are not viable at that point
Kolkhorst’s bill would require abortionists to “render aid, to do all they can to save that child,” she said. Those who do not could face third-degree felony charges and up to 10 years in prison, as well as civil penalties.
“I am pro-life and really would want to guide any woman from ever having an abortion,” she said. “This is about protecting life. … If a child were to be born alive, then that child would be protected, and that is what this bill intends to do.”
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The state House is considering a similar bill.
The Texas bills are similar to federal legislation that pro-abortion Democrats are blocking in the U.S. House and Senate. The Born Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act requires abortionists to provide the same level of medical care to an infant who survives an abortion as a doctor would to any other baby at the same stage of life.
Currently, 19 states do not have laws requiring medical care for babies born alive after botched abortions, according to research by Americans United for Life. However, Kentucky lawmakers are considering legislation similar to the Texas bill.
Some states never have passed laws to protect abortion survivors, while at least one other, New York, recently repealed its law requiring medical care for infants who survive abortions.
Reports by the Centers for Disease Control indicate that there are infants born alive after botched abortions in the U.S. According to Congressional testimony:
Data that the CDC collects also confirms babies are born alive after attempted abortions. Between the years 2003 and 2014 there were somewhere between 376 and 588 infant deaths under the medical code P96.4 which keeps track of babies born alive after a “termination of pregnancy.”
The CDC concluded that of the 588 babies, 143 were “definitively” born alive after an attempted abortion and they lived from minutes to one or more days, with 48% of the babies living between one to four hours. It also admitted that it’s possible the number is an underestimate (B).
Data from other countries suggest the same. In 2018, for example, the Canadian Institute of Health Information reported 766 late-term, live-birth abortions over a five-year period. In Western Australia, at least 27 babies survived abortions between 1999 and 2016, according to the state’s health minister.
Several known abortion survivors, including Melissa Ohden, Josiah Presley, Giana Jessen and Claire Culwell have been giving their testimonies in government hearings across the country this year. Some of them recently appeared on Fox News to urge Congress to pass a law requiring abortionists to provide basic medical care to babies who are born alive in botched abortions.
