"The Procedures of Abortion"

Abortion is the ending of a pregnancy before the woman gives birth. Depending upon how far along the pregnancy is, there are different procedures that may be preformed.

Abortions performed today are much safer than those performed hundreds of years ago. Many women would induce their own abortions to save themselves for public embarrassment. They would use coat hangers and knives, which later left them with painful diseases.

It used to be looked at as one of the most horrible things that one could do. Then again, I guess that not much has changed in some peoples' eyes. There are still many disputes on whether abortion should be legal. Some people only believe that an abortion may be carried out with in cases of rape, incest, or death to the mother for carrying the baby to term. Others think that abortion should not be legal under any circumstances. Some others seem to think that abortion is there as their birth control.

In very early abortions, the uterus is emptied with the gentle suction of a syringe. It can be done up to 49 days after the last menstrual period.

In some clinics, women can choose to end their pregnancies by using a combination of drugs, which is called a medical abortion. The U.S. FDA has not yet approved this method but is expected to do so in the near future. This procedure does not require any surgery. It must take place in the first six weeks.

Another procedure called suction curettage, preformed in the first-trimester. The abortionist dilates the cervix with a mechanical dilator or laminaria. Then he inserts a tube with larger diameter into the uterus due to the larger body parts of the fetus. The suction created by a vacuum tears the body of the fetus and the placenta apart. If the fetus's body parts are too large, the abortionist will remove them manually. This abortion procedure can damage a woman's uterine cavity resulting in scar and infection, in some cases parts of a woman's intestines were sucked out.

Another abortion procedure is called dilation and curettage, D&C for short. In this procedure, the cervix is dilated, a curette or a loop-shaped knife is inserted to cut up the fetus and scrape the uterine lining to detach the placenta.

Dilation and Evacuation is used during the second trimester. Due to the larger body of the fetus and the toughness of more developed fetal tissues, the cervix is dilated more and the fetus is dismembered by the abortionist grasping fetal body parts with an instrument to twist them off. The fetus's skull has to be crushed and its spine snapped for an easy removal. An ultrasound is needed at the end and an assistant needed to account for all body parts. To soften the fetal tissues of late second-trimester, the fetus sometimes was killed first by injecting urea into amniotic fluid or rupturing the membranes and cutting the umbilical cord 24 hours before the abortion.

Saline, Prostaglandin, and Urea Instillation is where the abortionist injects a concentrated salt solution or urea into the amniotic fluid surrounding the fetus which causes burning and poisoning as the fetus ingests the solution. Prostaglandin hormone injected will stimulate a uterine contraction to expel the fetus.

During the second and third trimesters, a hysterectomy or a hysterectomy is preformed. Like a Cesarean section, the abortionist surgically opens up the uterus and removes the fetus and the placenta. The fetus, who could be saved even as early as 21 weeks, is left to die.

Dilation and extraction is as well known as the partial-birth abortion in which the live fetus is inducedly delivered up to his head. Then the abortion forces a pair of curved scissors into the base of the skull of the fetus, enlarges the wound by opening up the scissors, inserts a suction catheter to suck out the brain and to collapse his skull for easy removal. This method is favored for a low rate of complications and for a safe abortion done to mature fetus during late pregnancy up to 32 weeks or more.