The Grand Jury Report In The Kermit Gosnell Case

Kermit Gosnell is the abortionist on trial in Philadelphia for killing babies. I am not going to print the Grand Jury Report because they are so disturbing, but here is the link.

There are many aspects of this case that are very troubling. How did this man find people who were willing to work with him in this abortion center? Why haven’t the pro-abortion groups come out with a statement every day condemning what went on in this abortion center? Why did the neighbors who heard the babies cry keep silent?

I hesitate to compare abortion to the Holocaust, but there are some parallels. There were people willing to participate in murder, neighbors kept silent, and the clinic had been operating for more than ten years. The government also complied by not holding abortion clinics to the same standards as other medical facilities.

This is an excerpt from Grand Jury report:

We discovered that Pennsylvania’s Department of Health has deliberately chosen not to enforce laws that should afford patients at abortion clinics the same safeguards and assurances of quality health care as patients of other medical service providers. Even nail salons in Pennsylvania are monitored more closely for client safety.The State Legislature has charged the Department of Health (DOH) with responsibility for writing and enforcing regulations to protect health and safety in abortion clinics as well as in hospitals and other health care facilities. Yet a significant difference exists between how DOH monitors abortion clinics and how it monitors facilities where other medical procedures are performed. Indeed, the department has shown an utter disregard both for the safety of women who seek treatment at abortion clinics and for the health of fetuses after they have become viable. State health officials have also shown a disregard for the laws the department is supposed to enforce. Most appalling of all, the Department of Health’s neglect of abortion patients’ safety and of Pennsylvania laws is clearly not inadvertent:

It is by design

Many organizations that perform safe abortion procedures do their own monitoring and adhere to strict, self-imposed standards of quality. But the excellent safety records and the quality of care that these independently monitored clinics deliver to patients are no thanks to the Pennsylvania Department of Health. And not all women seeking abortion find their way to these high-quality facilities; some end up in a filthy, dangerous clinic such as Gosnell’s. There the patients have to depend on DOH oversight to protect them – as do babies born alive, and helpless but viable fetuses after 24 weeks of gestation. Yet no protection is forthcoming. State health officials knew that Gosnell and his clinic were offering unacceptable medical care to women and girls, yet DOH failed to take any action to stop the atrocities documented by this Grand Jury. These officials were far more protective of themselves when they testified before the Grand Jury. Even DOH lawyers, including the chief counsel, brought private attorneys with them – presumably at government expense. Gosnell’s clinic – with its untrained staff, its unsanitary conditions and practices, its perilously lax anesthesia protocols, its willingness to perform late-term abortions for exorbitant amounts of cash, and its routine procedure of killing babies after they were delivered by their unconscious mothers – offers a telling example of how horrendous a Pennsylvania facility can be and still operate with DOH “approval.”

It is ironic to me that one of the reasons that the pro-abortion movement gave for legalizing abortion was that it would put an end to expensive, back-alley abortions and thus make women safer. This clinic was worse than any back-alley abortion and had the added ability to prescribe drugs (one patient was killed by an overdose of the drugs prescribed). I doubt that we can put the toothpaste back in the tube and put an end to the abortion business, but those who support unlimited abortion need to know that it has become a very lucrative industry and that genuine compassion for women is not part of the current picture–it’s about the money.

I need to mention at this point that I understand that there are circumstances when abortions are necessary for medical reasons. In those cases, I have no problem with a doctor performing an abortion in a hospital under ideal conditions. I would also like to mention that I am not sure that women who have abortions come through the procedure without emotional scars regardless of how ‘easy’ the procedure may seem. Many years ago I was asked to play the piano at a memorial service for an aborted baby. The mother was in counseling, and her counselor had recommended that the mother have a memorial service for the aborted child as part of her emotional healing from the abortion. I have also known a number of women who were unable to have children because of the scarring after a legal abortion. We need to think about the emotional and physical toll of this procedure.

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