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Atlanta, Ga. — Georgia’s abortion ban is limiting doctor’s abilities to care for their patients, two Georgia women told reporters today.
Today, during an oversight session with U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff, two Georgia women described how Georgia’s abortion ban impeded their doctor’s abilities to provide medical care, leading to life-threatening infections.
“My doctors warned me that I was now at high risk of developing a life-threatening infection called sepsis, on top of my continued risks from blood loss, and that my situation would become life threatening. They also told me that miscarriage was inevitable. At 18 weeks, my baby would not be able to survive outside the womb—and since my water had broken, he could no longer grow inside me, either,” Avery Davis Bell said.
Davis Bell, a research scientist in genetics, said she had to wait hours, while passing blood clots and becoming septic, before being able to receive life-saving treatment.
“My doctors assured me they were going to save my life but, because of Georgia’s abortion laws, my doctors had to balance what was best for me in the moment with navigating legal red tape,” Davis Bell continued. “Even with a doomed, non-viable pregnancy and at risk of death, I needed to be actively dying to receive a life-saving abortion. But determining when exactly I was dying, that’s not black and white and my doctors should not have had to wait to make that call because they knew I would get there.”
Pregnant with twins, Callie Beale Harper said she was denied urgently needed medical care after being told that carrying both twins to term would put her own life and the healthy twin’s life at risk.
“My doctor told me that I needed a selective reduction, a procedure to reduce the number of fetuses in my twin pregnancy, as soon as possible, to protect the other twin and myself. He advised me to seek care outside of Georgia, because Georgia’s restrictive law tied his hands,” Callie Beale Harper said. “My doctor further urged me to quickly secure multiple appointments in different states, only canceling once I had successfully received treatment, because constantly changing abortion laws in other states could further delay my care.”
Last year, as Chair of the Senate Human Rights Subcommittee, Sen. Ossoff convened two public hearings at which Georgia women and Georgia OBGYNs testified to the harmful impacts of Georgia’s abortion ban.
In July, OB-GYN doctors testified that women in Georgia are being denied care during miscarriages and gone into sepsis because of Georgian’s abortion ban, which they testified has hindered OGBYNs’ ability to do their jobs and could put them at risk of prosecution.
In September, two patients and an OBGYN testified in Atlanta that the State’s abortion ban is forcing Georgia women to continue high-risk and nonviable pregnancies.
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