National Advocates for Pregnant Women's Statement on Melissa Rowland

Dear Friends and Allies:

As you may know, a pregnant woman in Utah who allegedly ignored medical
warnings to have a caesarian section to save her twins was charged Thursday
with murder after one of the babies was stillborn. We are reaching out to
her public defender and using our public education networks to challenge the
legitimacy of this dehumanzing and counterproductive use of the criminal
law. Below is a commentary we are submitting to various papers around the
country. We hope you find it useful in developing your responses as well.
We will also be working on a piece about how this arrest is the obvious and
predictable outcome of attempts to personify the fetus in the law through
the Unborn Victims of Violence Act and similar legislation.

NAPW Commentary on Murder Arrest of Pregnant Woman Who Refused a C-Section

An arrest in Utah yesterday of 28 year old Melissa Rowland who allegedly
committed murder by refusing a recommended C-section represents a shocking
abuse of state authority and a dangerous disregard for medical ethics.

In this case prosecutors claim that a woman pregnant with twins rejected
advice of her physicians to have a cesarean section. Prosecutors assert
that the stillbirth of one of the twins was caused by her refusal to undergo
this surgery. According to the law, however, pregnant women, like other
Americans have the right to decide whether or not to undergo surgery. The
American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and
Gynecologists as well other leading medical groups similarly conclude that
the final decision must be the woman's.

These legal and medical -ethical principles make sense for both women and
children. Doctors are not infallible and their advice is just that, advice.
Recently a woman went to a hospital in Pennsylvania ready to deliver her
seventh child. For reasons that remain far from clear, the hospital decided
she needed a c-section and when she refused they went to court. They asked
for and won an order giving the hospital custody of the fetus before during
and after delivery and the right to take custody of the pregnant woman and
forcer to have the cesarean surgery. She and her husband fled the hospital
and delivered a perfectly health baby without surgery. Similar cases
abound. In Georgia doctors got a court order claiming that without a
c-section the baby had a 99% chance of dying and the woman a 50% chance of
dying. The court granted the order, she fled and delivered a healthy baby
vaginally. Neither women nor children are protected by a system that makes
women flee from hospitals or subjects them to unnecessary surgery.

Angela Carder was not as lucky. Critically ill with a recurrence of cancer
and 25 weeks pregnant, she, her family and attending physicians agreed to
focus on prolonging her young life for as long as possible. The Hospital
however sought a court order forcing her to have a c-section. Despite
testimony that the surgery could kill her, the court concluded that the
fetus had a right to life and ordered her to be cut open against her will.
The surgery was performed: the fetus died within two hours and Angela died
within two days with the c-section listed as a contributing factor. No one
suggested arresting the doctor or hospital officials for murder, in that
case arguably a double homicide.

Ayesha Madyun survived. She was forced to have a c-section based on the
claim that she had been in labor too long and that her baby was at risk of
dying from an infection. Her request to be allowed to wait longer before
having the surgery so she could try natural delivery was portrayed to the
court as an irrational religious objection to surgery. The court granted the
order and after Ms. Madyun had been forcibly cut open they found that there
was in fact no infection.

The ability to get a court order or threaten pregnant women with arrest has
many negative consequences beyond denying pregnant women rights and
performing unnecessary surgery that poses health risks to both the pregnant
woman and fetus. In another Illinois case, doctors sought a court order for
a forced c-section claiming the pregnant woman and her husband held
irrational religious beliefs opposing all surgery. The doctors ran to the
court instead of spending time with the patient. The court refused the
order, the baby was delivered naturally, and it turned out that if the
doctors had spent the time communicating with the patient and her family
rather than judging them and rushing to court, they would have learned that
it was misunderstanding not an absolute objection to surgery that made it
appear that this couple was refusing a recommended (but unnecessary)
c-section.

Today both the law and medicine agree that coerced medical interventions on
pregnant women are an abuse of medical and state authority and that while
pregnant women do not always make the right decision, in America, it is the
person on whom the surgery is to be performed who gets to decide. In spite
of this, Utah prosecutors apparently think that a pregnant woman who
exercises her constitutional and common-law right to refuse medical advice
can be arrested for murder. This is not only a clear misuse of the law, it
is dangerous to children and fundamentally dehumanizing to pregnant women
and their families.


Lynn M. Paltrow
Executive Director
National Advocates for Pregnant Women
153 Waverly Place, 6th Floor
New York, New York 10014
212-255-9252
917-921-7421
212-254-9679 (fax)
LMPNYC@aol.com
www.advocatesforpregnantwomen.org

I find it totally frightening that Utah authorities are pursuing this case. I also knew there was more to this story than 'she didn't want a scar'. No case is that simple.

It really seems like most Repukes think women are just incapable of making decisions about their own bodies. That type of paternalistic, misogynist thinking is terrifying; it was also Hitler's opinion.

I thought it was about time someone posted some facts about coerced medical care and the right to refuse surgery.

Will they make you have a baby if you do not want one? Is it right to have children if you can not have them naturally? Will you have to take pills if you can not pay for them? I could go on with the silly things I can think of that I do not wish to do that some Doctor that was in the lower half of his class tells me to do. I once lost a child because of one stupid doctor. My mother had to take pills for ever because of a stupid doctor. If the women did not want the operation it is her business. I am telling you the Republicans love to get into your bedroom any way they can.

They're doing their best - abortion services not available in over 80% of US counties; the fight against over-the-counter emergency contraception, "abstinence-only" sex 'education'.... Women are apparently just vessels, and only valuable when incubating a fetus. Women are so devoid of value they can be cut open on a whim to save the precious contents. Truly frightening.

Getting sterilized is one of the smartest things I've ever done, especially in these times.

By the time I was 23 and my daughter was 6 I knew I wanted my tubes tied. I was tired of going on different BCPs and suffering all the side effects and knew I was never going to get married and have kids.

Several different ob/gyns I went to from the time I was 23 until I was in my late 30s all turned me down. "You just haven't found the right man, when you do, you'll want his babies." Never did meet that right man.

It wasn't until '98, when I was 36 and my daughter was 18 and graduating high school, that I found a woman ob/gyn who finally said YES.

I joke that I also did it out of political protest. It's not so funny, though, when I think about what women are facing now. We live in such dangerous times and yes, for me too, getting my tubes tied was one of the smartest things I've ever done.

Every time I hear about a case like yours, I have to wonder about the arrogance of these doctors. Why do they assume that their patients are airheads who do not know what they want? I am glad that you finally found a doctor that was willing to listen to you and treat you like an adult. I just think that it is a shame that it took so long.

In my case, I was told repeatedly that I'd "change my mind" and want children. I've never heard of a woman being told that she might change her mind about having children when discussing pregnancy.... My mind never changed, and I finally found a doctor who treated me a human being, instead of a walking uterus.

Some doctors refuse to perform tubals on women under 30, married women without WRITTEN permission from their husbands (are we still living in the age when women were property?), women without children.

I have even heard of doctors refusing utterly to perform a hysterectomy on a teenage girl who had a serious, life-threatening medical condition where childbirth would kill her if she ever got pregnant. All because she was "too young and might want children some day". Hello! She wants to LIVE. And not have excruciatingly painful periods every month. This is NOT NORMAL. But no, her uterus is too damn valuable and she's just a female.

Seems to me it's just another example of the "never trust a woman" attitude permeating our culture.

and wrote this.

It's well worth reading their site.

They have also been active in opposition to the practice of charging pregnant women with various kinds of drug trafficking and child abuse offences for using drugs during pregnancy.

As in many situations involving rights, there are many arguments against violations of those rights other than the purely theoretical. In the case of pregnant women who use drugs:

- the use of criminal law to deal with what is a social and health problem will make it less likely that pregnant women with drug abuse problems will seek the help that could benefit them and the babies they eventually deliver, because they will be afraid of losing their liberty during their pregnancy and being subject to criminal charges (ditto for women with high-risk pregnancies who fear being compelled to accept treatment like Caesarian sections); charging pregnant women does not reduce the harm that doing it is supposedly meant to reduce, and in fact probably increases it;

- imposing this kind of "responsibility" on pregnant women is irrational, since many pregnant women lack the means to fulfil it: is the state really going to provide all of the medical care and other services that women need in order to guarantee the health and safety of the children they eventually deliver -- which s of course impossible, and impossible to predict, anyway? will in utero surgery costing thousands and thousands of dollars, for instance, be provided free of charge to every woman whose fetus has a treatable defect so that she can fulfil this legal duty to do what is best for her future child? does the state provide adequate drug abuse treatment? does it even provide pre-natal vitamins? Positive duties may not be imposed on people who do not have the means of fulfilling them;

- unsurprisingly, the burden falls heaviest, in the US, on those most affected by the problems that laying criminal charges is supposed to address, and most unable to meet the duties being imposed on them: the poor and drug users, and particularly disproportionately on African-Americans (NAPW addresses the racial issues at its site; see "cases and issues" at http://www.advocatesforpregnantwomen.org/issues/index.htm); in Canada, it was First Nations women who were the first victims of detention by child welfare authorities to prevent them from engaging in behaviours deemed to be contrary to the interests of the children they would deliver.

There's a reason we have these ideas of "rights" and "liberties", after all. They're just the most elegant way we have come up with of achieving a whole lot of the goals that we, as societies, have adopted -- not just non-interference in individuals' personal lives. Leaving people free to make their own choices unless there are demonstrably overriding reasons for doing otherwise -- coupled with providing them with access to the means to do what is in their own best interests unless it is not possible to do so -- is the approach most likely to lead to what is best for everybody.

All too commonly, in the US in particular, society feels no responsibility for ensuring that individuals have the means to do what is in their own best interests even where others are affected, but has no compunctions when it comes to blaming them for failing to do it, using the full weight of the criminal law in what are really the most egregious situations of individuals whom society failed in the first place.

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was a "test" case that was rigged from the get-go so as to bring about state control of reproduction.
http://www.dnalc.org/resources/buckvbell.html

History is about to repeat itself.

because I fear that the whole point of the 'fetus is a viable human' lwas is to persecute pregnant women and force them to comply with the wishes of the state. First step: make it legal that pregnant women have no control over what happens to their bodies. Second step: make it legal that no woman has control over what happens to their bodies. Third step: make it legal that women are chattel, just like they were in the nineteenth century.

Thank you for posting this. Those individuals who favor trying Rowland for murder should familiarize themselves with these cases because they demonstrate the dangers of allowing medical professionals and the courts to force pregnant women to get medical procedures that they do not want to get. They also demonstrate that the courts and members of the medical profession are not infallible.

I also wonder how many of us would cheerfully tolerate allowing others to force us to make certain medical decisions. For example, how many of us would like to be forced to donate blood or a kidney? Even though donating a kidney might save a life, most of us would still resent such an intrusion.

There is a tendency to view pregnant women's bodies as community property. Most people (with a few notable exceptions) would never dream of walking up to a bald man and touching his head. Yet some people will walk up to a complete stranger and touch her stomach because she is pregnant.

The tendency to view pregnant women as community property may partially explain why prosecutors are willing to prosecute Rowland. Another reason they are willing to prosecute her is because they feel that most people will not have sympathy for Rowland. They believe that people will accept the nurse's claims as the absolute gospel and will want to punish this woman for being so selfish. They expect us to focus on whether or not this woman is likable instead of the legal aspects of this case.

However, we must think about the legal aspects of this case. If the prosecutors win this case, what is to stop other prosecutors from not prosecuting other women because they decided they would rather hire a midwife instead of a doctor? We cannot ignore the fact that this case could establish a very dangerous legal precedent for pregnant women.

Parents are allowed to refuse to donate blood or organs to their child, even if they are the only possible donors and the child would die without the donation. In this case, there was no certainty that a c-section would have prevented the stillbirth, and people are ready to flay her alive. I've never heard of a man being cut open against his will because his child needs a kidney, and there are is no presumptions that a man must be crazy not to undergo surgery (and risk his life) that might save his child.

Just a reminder that while the Bush administration and the RW continues to chip away at women's reproductive rights (and let us not forget Ashcroft's pursuit of women's medical records via certain universities) that NOW is the time to join NARAL, Planned Parenthood, the National Organization for Women or other groups that are valiantly continuing to fight for women's rights.

That fight requires support, and not just financial support. Before we see "The Handmaid's Tale" become a frightful reality in this country, please consider joining the battle before its too late!

The March For Women's Lives will take place in Washington, DC on April 25th! You can find more information at:

The National Organization for Women at http://www.NOW.org
Planned Parenthood at http://www.plannedparenthood.org/ Advocates for Pregnant Women at http://www.advocatesforpregnantwomen.org/
and the National Abortion Rights Action League (Pro-Choice America) at http://www.NARAL.org and http://www.ProChoice America.org

This from NARAL, at ProChoiceAmerica.org:

The Rights of Pregnant Women
Special restrictions on pregnant women create a dangerous precedent for wide-ranging government intrusion into the lives of all women.

Women, due to their ability to become pregnant, have faced inappropriate treatment by judges and prison officials. Courts and prisons have imposed harsher sentences and have interfered with women's reproductive choices.

Pregnant women have been forced to undergo unwanted cesareans; ordered to have their cervixes sewn up to prevent miscarriage; incarcerated for consuming alcohol.

There is a racist element in many of these cases. Although drug use crosses all racial and class lines, poor women of color have overwhelmingly been the ones targeted and arrested for using drugs while pregnant.

Punitive measures do not promote healthy childbearing; instead, they deter women from seeking necessary treatment and prenatal care.

"Fetal protection laws" such as the proposed "Unborn Victims of Violence Act" could create a cage of restrictive rules on women fashioned to "protect," the fetus, turning back the clock to the days women — but not men — were forbidden from working in industrial settings because their employers were afraid to incur liability for harm to their fertility.

Additionally, the current Administration has demonstrated a lack of concern for the rights and well being of pregnant women in the name of anti-choice politics by proposing insuring the fetus as a separate individual. The classification of a fetus as individual separate from the woman has a potential to create barriers to health care for pregnant women with illnesses. For instance, would a pregnant woman with cancer be able to access potentially life-saving radiation treatment or chemotherapy, since such treatment could harm the pregnancy?

Much more....

A press release from NOW.org

NOW Condemns Utah Murder Prosecution for Delayed Cesarean Delivery

March 12, 2004

"The prosecution of Melissa Ann Rowland is appalling for so many reasons, I hardly know where to begin," said NOW President Kim Gandy. "This woman, who has a lifelong history of mental illness, is being prosecuted for not following a doctor's advice regarding her pregnancy - actually she did follow it, but just not quickly enough to suit the Salt Lake prosecutor. Some doctors may think they are God, but when did 'doctor's orders' become the law?"

Authorities in Salt Lake City have now charged 28-year-old Melissa Ann Rowland with the murder of one of her twins, who was stillborn in January. Rowland was advised by doctors to have a cesarean section, but Rowland refused, having experienced the invasive procedure in two prior deliveries where she had been cut "breast bone to pubic bone."

She did eventually have the "c-section," but is being prosecuted because she didn't have it early enough -- on the theory that the stillborn twin might have survived if she had delivered earlier. One day after the operation, she was jailed on endangerment charges because drugs were reported to be in the system of the surviving twin. "This is absolutely inhumane treatment," said Gandy. "This woman had major surgery on one day and was thrown into jail the very next day. I imagine that it was very apparent to these people that this woman was mentally ill, suffering from addiction and loss, and in considerable pain. What is wrong with these people?"

"Our legal system recognizes every person's right to bodily integrity and the right to make your own medical decisions. You can't force a father to donate a kidney, or bone marrow or even blood to save his child's life -- yet Utah is prosecuting a woman for murder because she delayed having a cesarean section! Where will the pre-natal police be stationed?" asked Gandy, "Will pregnant women risk prosecution for having wine with dinner? Will women be prosecuted for taking their own life-saving medications because those drugs might harm the fetus? Where will it stop?"

"This is an example of 'fetal rights' replacing the bodily integrity and autonomy of women under the law," said Gandy. "When a woman becomes pregnant, she does not give up her rights to personal autonomy."

kick

Good to read some logic in the midst of the hysteria about this case.

may affect any future pregnancies. If you drink, use drugs, don't have great nutrition or medical help then any future pregnancies and fetuses could be harmed. If women can be charged with murder for refusing a doctor's advice, how much of a stretch is it that women can be charged for not following medical advice their entire lives before pregnancy.


The rise of Doctors and their supposed omnipotence can be traced to eroding the female power of midwives in 1400 to 1500s. At that time, most medicine was provided by women midwives and herbalists. The male Doctors made a concerted effort to takeover. Throughout the ensuing centuries, the male powerful Doctor gained power. They were almost seen as infallible. The last 20 years, or so, has started an erosion of that power. The patients rights movement, educating patients, getting second opinions, and the empowerment of women have all contributed to the change. I see this case as challenging the rights of doctors to control a patient's medical care. It's not just against women, but the entire rights of all of us to have a say in our medical treatment.

The rise of Doctors and their supposed omnipotence can be traced to eroding the female power of midwives in 1400 to 1500s. At that time, most medicine was provided by women midwives and herbalists.


Amazing that so many were born healthy and whole at home scarcely a hundred years ago, and that so many are still born at home in many places in the world. Wonder how we women managed without men to take care of our deliveries, eh?

Midwives and herbalists also knew which teas and infusions worked to prevent pregnancy or to abort a pregnancy. Now, so much of that knowledge is gone.

or so i have read. not surprising. they are still portraying strong women as witches, with much success.

i don't know too many doctors who appove of home birth, in spite of it's amazing record of safe birth, as well as formation of strong and happy families. there is already a lot of legal b.s. regarding midwives, including indicting midwives who deliver stillborns babies, whether they had any control over it or not.
knock, knock. who's there? big brother.

I'm going to print this out and show it to everyone I've been arguing with about this for the past few days, especially the clueless, holier-than-thou men.

As I asked on the previous threads about this, why isn't the fact that over 18,000 people die every year as a direct result of having no medical insurance considered a "depraved indifference to human life" by doctors?

Why aren't the hospitals who use the collection technique of "body attachments" to throw uninsured people who can't pay their medical bills after having the nerve to become ill with such trivial things as pneumonia, viral meningitis, miscarriages and cancer, in jail, and who empploy aggressive, ruthless collection tactics against the uninsured such as foreclosing on their houses, taking what little assets they may have, wiping out their bank accounts or garnishing their wages at an amount that leaves them little to live on, considered to have a "depraved indifference to human life?"

Why aren't the doctors who refuse to treat low-income high-risk pregnant women, or ANY low-income pregnant woman for that matter, because their Medicaid doesn't pay enough or they don't have insurance considered to have a "depraved indifference to human life?"

Why aren't the doctors who are responsible for the medical mistakes that cost 90,000 lives a year considered to have a "depraved indifference to human life?"

When I was in labor with my son thirteen years ago, my water broke after eight hours of hard labor. Unbeknownst to me at the time, there was merconium staining, which means that the baby had a bowel movement in the womb. Normally, when that happens they try to do a c-section ASAP, because it's poisonous for the baby to have to "stew" in that poison until it's delivered. But they let me continue on in labor for another TWELVE FUCKING HOURS before they did the c-section/ Wanna know why? Because, at that time, I was on Medicaid, and both the hospital and doctor would get less money if they did a c-section.

And when I finally did have one, after almost THIRTY FUCKING HOURS OF LABOR, the doc came striding grandly into the room and announced that "we're going to do a c-section since you've been in labor too long and haven't dilated like you should." No explaining the circumstances and asking what I wanted to do or what I thought, just a striding importantly into the room and announcing that that was what was going to happen and that was that.

I was beyond furious when I found out later from a sympathetic nurse that there had been merconium staining in my water when it broke and that they hadn't done the c-section right then as they should have because I was on Medicaid and that meant less money. That goddamned greedy doctor is lucky my son didn't suffer any consequences from that, because I would have sued his ass so bad he never would have been able to have practiced ever again!

Doctors are not God, they aren't infallible, and the good ones will be the first to admit it. They have NO RIGHT, nor should they EVER have the right, to "order" anyone to do anything, the ultimate decision should still be with the individual, whether the doc likes it or not. Rowland's docs couldn't have guaranteed for sure that the baby would have survived had they done the c-section when they ordered her to, and I simply cannot believe we're dealing with this shit in this day and age. I just wish I were a lawyer instead of a paralegal, and that I lived in Salt Lake City, because I would offer to defend Rowland FREE OF CHARGE no matter how long it took!

And, like I said in the previous thread, behold the coming of the pregnancy bodyguards. If the wingnuts win this culture war, then it won't be long before each pregnant woman will be assigned a "pregnancy bodyguard" 24/7, whether she likes it or not, who will watch everything she does, eats, drinks, says, etc., etc. Mark my words, it'll happen if the wingnuts finally gain total control and win this culture war!

... it is plain scary how out of their minds these prosecutors are.

I can only pray that the jury (if this absurd case ever gets to one) hands them a nice slap of 'not guilty'.

for a great educational thread. i hope some of the folks who were ready to string up the woman in utah read this. :kick:

There's some more demonizing of the woman going on in the media, it seems, and of course on the front page of GD. Never hurts to keep the real issues front and centre, and up top.

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:kick:

Today both the law and medicine agree that coerced medical interventions on pregnant women are an abuse of medical and state authority and that while pregnant women do not always make the right decision, in America, it is the person on whom the surgery is to be performed who gets to decide.

Thank you. :thumbsup:

Thanks for reading it.

Thanks for bringing us the real story. Good God, is there no mercy, justice, or sanity left in this country?

Hekate

:kick:

That the usual anti-choicers are stunningly silent when presented with the facts of this case?

Thank you for posting this piece.

Thanks for posting this.

:kick:

for this thread.

This is SO important. We cannot allow the state to claim ownership of women's bodies. And knowledge is the beginning of the power to fight the Talibornagain right.