A 30-year-old pregnant woman in Georgia has been on life support for three months, despite being declared brain-dead, due to the state's abortion laws, according to her mother. April Newkirk stated that the choice to keep her daughter, Adriana Smith, alive was made without consulting the family.
"This decision should have been ours to make," she told local NBC affiliate WXIA-TV. Newkirk explained that Smith, a registered nurse, was experiencing severe headaches in February while she was nine weeks pregnant. During her first hospital visit, she was given only a prescription for medication.
The following morning, after being taken to the hospital where she was employed, doctors discovered multiple blood clots in her brain, leading to her being declared brain dead. In Georgia, abortion procedures are prohibited after six weeks of pregnancy, in accordance with one of the 'heartbeat' laws, which refers to the approximate time when a fetal heartbeat can first be detected.
At nine weeks into her pregnancy, doctors were reluctant to take any actions that might violate the law, as noted by Newkirk. Since then, Smith has remained on life support and is now 21 weeks pregnant. “I’m not suggesting that we would have opted to end her pregnancy; rather, I believe we should have had the option,” Newkirk stated. Smith, who is already a mother to a son, has been placed on a ventilator to support the pregnancy, although Newkirk mentioned that doctors are uncertain about the viability of the pregnancy or the potential for health complications.
Chilling Effect
Katie Watson, a professor at Northwestern University who specializes in medical ethics and reproductive rights, stated that the abortion law does not pertain to cases like Smith's.
"The Georgia abortion statute is entirely unrelated to the act of removing a ventilator from a brain-dead individual. It does not address this situation, even if the individual is pregnant at the time of death," Watson explained to AFP on Friday.
"If the family's account of what the hospital communicated is correct, then the hospital has made an unexpected misinterpretation of Georgia's abortion law," she added.
Watson suggested that the hospital's actions might stem from concerns about legal liability, describing this as a "chilling effect" of the laws surrounding abortion. Emory Healthcare, the hospital system treating Smith, did not respond promptly to AFP's request for comment. The situation has sparked significant backlash from Democrats and abortion rights advocates. "Everyone deserves the freedom to determine what is best for their families, futures, and lives," stated Democratic Congresswoman Nikema Williams of Georgia.
Williams accused U.S. President Donald Trump and Georgia Governor Brian Kemp, both Republicans, of “subjecting people to unimaginable suffering.”
Monica Simpson, executive director of SisterSong, an advocacy organization dedicated to reproductive justice for women of color, stated, “It is deadly to be Black and pregnant in a state where reproductive care is restricted and criminalized.”
Following the U.S. Supreme Court's 2022 decision to revoke federal protections for abortion rights, states like Georgia have enacted stringent anti-abortion laws.
Trump, who appointed three conservative justices to the Supreme Court during his first term, has often claimed credit for the overturning of Roe v. Wade, which had guaranteed the right to terminate a pregnancy.
