State lawmakers are attempting to ban dilation and evacuation, a common abortion procedure performed in the second trimester. The bill criminalizing it moved from the Indiana House of Representatives to the Senate on Feb. 22.
Dilation and evacuation involves using suction and various instruments to remove the fetus from the womb. Currently, Indiana allows the procedure from 14 weeks to 21 weeks and 6 days. The bill would make it a level 5 felony to perform the operation.
According to the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization focused on reproductive health, 11 percent of abortions in the U.S. occur after the first trimester. Of that 11 percent, 95 percent are dilation and evacuation abortions.
Rep. Peggy Mayfield, R-Martinsville, author of the bill, said in a statement the practice of dilation and evacuation is a horrific procedure which involves removing the fetus while it may still be alive.
“Dismemberment abortion is an extremely brutal process, and we must discourage this practice in Indiana,” Mayfield said in the statement.
Mayfield’s bill would allow the procedure in cases when the doctor believes there is legitimate medical need, such as the life of the mother being in danger if she continues the pregnancy. This bill excludes physiological and emotional conditions.
Elizabeth Bartelt, a School of Public Health doctoral student, said the bill is an attempt to control women’s bodies.
“I think this bill is being put out because it is an attempt to tell people when they can have children and when they can’t,” Bartelt said.
Bartelt said most people who are seeking this abortion are not doing so lightly. She said the service is typically provided when there is legitimate medical need or the fetus is no longer viable.
Poor communities would be hurt by these types of restrictions, Bartelt said. Affluent people would be able to travel out of state to access the abortions.
Bartelt said one of the bigger problems of the bill is it may make the general public doubt its doctors, especially about the safety of the procedure.
Mayfield regularly authors anti-abortion bills. Bartelt said she thinks these bills may be a way to satisfy Mayfield’s base, which is largely right-wing and Christian.
Wanda Savala, public affairs director for Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Kentucky, said the bill represents a history of chipping away at abortion rights.
Savala said the viability timeline doesn’t come from science but rather is based in politics. She said many bills attempt to put a deadline on abortions depending on viability.
However, Savala said viability isn’t a number. She said the supreme court case Roe v. Wade recognizes this, and that is the reason why there is no gestational deadline found in the ruling.
Bartelt said abortion rights advocates fear this will go to the U.S. Supreme Court and with the current court makeup, Roe v. Wade could have a chance of being overturned. Bartelt said anti-abortion supporters hope for that result.
