Death Certificates on Abortions Proposed

[Guest LadyC]

"The number of abortions reported to the state Office of Vital Records is already publicly available. The office collects records _ but not death certificates _ on abortions and the deaths of fetuses after 22 weeks gestation or weighing about 1 pound."

I don't know how I can explain it any clearer than this. If the number of lives being ended out there by abortions is already avaliable, why is the bill being proposed? Someone is not telling the truth about the intent.

i never said your views on privacy are anti christian. AK and i both have stated that your views on when life begins are clearly unbiblical, therefore anti-christian.

so are your opinions on the authority of scripture though, so that pretty much invalidates anything else.

You must be confusing me with someone else. I have never stated my beliefs concerning abortion in this thread, or my views on when life begins. You are putting beliefs in my mouth and condemning me for them.

pay close attention to what YOU posted. fetuses after 22 weeks. that is LONG after the first trimester. thousands of abortions take place in this country every day during the first trimester. so according to what YOU posted, THOSE abortions are not recorded or reported at all. you're right, someone is not telling the truth about their intent. i'd say the senator who wrote this bill is pretty forthcoming.

my opinion of nothing is authoritative. God's word, however, is the ultimate authority, and your stated opinion is in contradiction to God's word.

sorry for putting words in your mouth if you did not state your opinion on when life begins. i thought you'd made it abundantly clear by the context of your comments and your refusal to admit what you believe.

so if you don't want to be condemned for believing that an unborn child is not human life, please clarify your position.

[Guest LadyC]

The first paragraph caught my eye, I'm not so sure that is correct. By 6 weeks I always know when I am pregnant. My period is 4 weeks late by this time and I usually have morning sickness, my breasts are quite sore and have grown rapidly, and my pants don't even fit properly anymore (I am rather thin). By 6 weeks I am convinced I either have some strange terminal illness, or I must be pregnant. Now 3 weeks LMP, that would make more sense. By 1 week after conception, which is 3 weeks LMP, the blastocyst needs to successfully implant into the lining of the womb, or it self aborts. When the blastocyst has succesfuuly embedded into the lining of the uterus and miscarries later, then I am sure the woman needs to be seen by a doctor. All the women I know of who had an early miscarriage needed a D & C which required general anesthesia.

no kidding, emily. i have two daughters. i was fully aware that i was pregnant by the second week, both times. in each case, the day my period was due and didn't come, i took a pregnancy test the following morning. both times it indicated i was pregnant. both times i carried to full term.

and ironically, that was back in the day before pregnancy tests were supposed to be that sensitive! at the time, i think you were supposed to be two weeks late before the pregnancy tests were known to detect the hormone levels.

[forrestkc]

forrest, do you have any idea how silly that sounds? you're calling for an investigation into the death of a child that nobody even knew yet existed, including the mother? how do you propose one should do that? if the mother was unaware she was pregnant, who is going to report a miscarriage and call for an investigation? do you propose that we run medical examinations treating all females of childbearing age as criminals every four to six weeks during their entire menstruating life? like i've said before... you really need to consider using arguments that make even a lick of sense before pecking out nonsense on your keyboard.

That is the point, it is absurd. To issue a death certificate for an abortion is as absurd as issuing a death certificate for a miscarriage, but since the vast majority of abortions occur by 12 weeks, if we issued death certificates for an abortion, then we would also have to issue them for miscarriages. Which as a result would open up a slew of legal issues. Which is why the whole proposal is just absurd. That is the whole point.

thank you for quoting the laws regarding autopsies, i couldn't find it. you're quoting it cleared up what i'd already presumed, and didn't help your argument at all. when a person dies at home, they investigate to make sure no foul play was involved. if no evidence of trauma or foul play is found, NO AUTOPSY is performed.

so all a medical examiner (or physician) would have to do is what i've already stated should be done, and IS done if the woman goes to the hospital after a miscarriage... check to see if the woman has intentionally caused injury to her unborn child... i.e. (a gynocological exam and blood tests. let them run toxicology reports too, that would be great... but if a woman didn't know she was pregnant, it COULD NOT be deemed "intentional".

That is the point, if we treated miscarriages like a person died, then there would be an investigation, possibly the woman would be legally compelled to have a medical examination, and possibly an autopsy would have to be performed. A total invasion of privacy and civil liberties on the part of the government.

nice quote on the laws too regarding payment of information. i beg to differ. the STATE WEBSITE is very clear that proof of identity and relationship to the deceased is required.

Yes, to either order the Death Certificate over the Internet, or to obtain a certified copy of the Death Certificate (you were looking at the section on requesting a certified copy). However, I think you are misinformed as to the whole point of a public record. A public record means that it is a record that is publicly available. Thus, if you walk into a Tennessee Office of Vital Records, you can request a non-certified copy of a Tennessee Death Certificate for anyone who died after 1955, and the only information not available to you is the cause of death. Which would be obvious if it occured at an office that performs abortions.

Look at their website: http://www2.state.tn.us/health/vr/#REQUEST

I had my wife, who is a paralegal and obtains such information all the time verify that for me, and that is the case. Vital statistics such as birth records, death records, marriage records and divorce records, are public records and are available to anyone for any reason.

If you don

[forrestkc]

context? looks like the only source of scripture he consulted was the message. the NIV, KJV, NKJV, AMS all state premature birth, not miscarriage.

It was the New American Bible, the official Catholic Bible in America, and I think we know what the Catholic position on abortion is. When I responded to his post, I went into more depth on the ambiguity of the Bible toward this issue.

[Guest LadyC]

i should point out a little more clearly for hamburger..... 22 weeks gestation. do you realize that is more than halfway through a pregnancy?

here's some stats for you. according to the CDC, 88% (apparently estimated since some states don't record early abortions) of all abortions take place during the first 12 weeks.

only ONE PERCENT of recorded abortions occur after the 21st week.

that should answer your question about what the point is.

[Guest LadyC]

forrest, do you have any idea how silly that sounds? you're calling for an investigation into the death of a child that nobody even knew yet existed, including the mother? how do you propose one should do that? if the mother was unaware she was pregnant, who is going to report a miscarriage and call for an investigation? do you propose that we run medical examinations treating all females of childbearing age as criminals every four to six weeks during their entire menstruating life? like i've said before... you really need to consider using arguments that make even a lick of sense before pecking out nonsense on your keyboard.

That is the point, it is absurd. To issue a death certificate for an abortion is as absurd as issuing a death certificate for a miscarriage, but since the vast majority of abortions occur by 12 weeks, if we issued death certificates for an abortion, then we would also have to issue them for miscarriages. Which as a result would open up a slew of legal issues. Which is why the whole proposal is just absurd. That is the whole point.

thank you for quoting the laws regarding autopsies, i couldn't find it. you're quoting it cleared up what i'd already presumed, and didn't help your argument at all. when a person dies at home, they investigate to make sure no foul play was involved. if no evidence of trauma or foul play is found, NO AUTOPSY is performed.

so all a medical examiner (or physician) would have to do is what i've already stated should be done, and IS done if the woman goes to the hospital after a miscarriage... check to see if the woman has intentionally caused injury to her unborn child... i.e. (a gynocological exam and blood tests. let them run toxicology reports too, that would be great... but if a woman didn't know she was pregnant, it COULD NOT be deemed "intentional".

That is the point, if we treated miscarriages like a person died, then there would be an investigation, possibly the woman would be legally compelled to have a medical examination, and possibly an autopsy would have to be performed. A total invasion of privacy and civil liberties on the part of the government.

nice quote on the laws too regarding payment of information. i beg to differ. the STATE WEBSITE is very clear that proof of identity and relationship to the deceased is required.

Yes, to either order the Death Certificate over the Internet, or to obtain a certified copy of the Death Certificate (you were looking at the section on requesting a certified copy). However, I think you are misinformed as to the whole point of a public record. A public record means that it is a record that is publicly available. Thus, if you walk into a Tennessee Office of Vital Records, you can request a non-certified copy of a Tennessee Death Certificate for anyone who died after 1955, and the only information not available to you is the cause of death. Which would be obvious if it occured at an office that performs abortions.

Look at their website: http://www2.state.tn.us/health/vr/#REQUEST

I had my wife, who is a paralegal and obtains such information all the time verify that for me, and that is the case. Vital statistics such as birth records, death records, marriage records and divorce records, are public records and are available to anyone for any reason.

If you don

[Guest LadyC]

context? looks like the only source of scripture he consulted was the message. the NIV, KJV, NKJV, AMS all state premature birth, not miscarriage.

It was the New American Bible, the official Catholic Bible in America, and I think we know what the Catholic position on abortion is. When I responded to his post, I went into more depth on the ambiguity of the Bible toward this issue.

since when is the NAB an official catholic bible? i was under the impression that the official Bible of the catholic church was still the KJV.

in any case, your further depth on the ambiguity of this issue in the Bible seemed rather.... ambiguous. maybe i didn't read it carefully enough, but it sounded to me like you were not conceding to the fact that the Bible differentiates between miscarriage and premature birth in that passage, because the version you are choosing to read from calls it something that it is not.

[Guest LadyC]

i looked up info on the NAB. it is not a word-for-word translation, so it is in essence much like the message.

i'm not saying that's a bad thing, i personally love the message bible. but not for serious study. they're paraphrases, the message and the NAB... great for ease of understanding and for encouraging new readers, but they are known for not being entirely accurate to the scripture.

[Oh Hamburgers!]

pay close attention to what YOU posted. fetuses after 22 weeks. that is LONG after the first trimester. thousands of abortions take place in this country every day during the first trimester. so according to what YOU posted, THOSE abortions are not recorded or reported at all. you're right, someone is not telling the truth about their intent. i'd say the senator who wrote this bill is pretty forthcoming.

Very interesting. I wonder what they are doing today that reports abortions after 22 weeks, but doesn't report abortions before 22 weeks? Surely, you would think they could do the same thing that they are doing now, only have physicians report ALL abortions, before and after the 22 week period. That would give us the numbers we are looking for, while at the same time protecting the privacy of the women involved.

That to me seems like a much more logical solution.

[Guest LadyC]

pay close attention to what YOU posted. fetuses after 22 weeks. that is LONG after the first trimester. thousands of abortions take place in this country every day during the first trimester. so according to what YOU posted, THOSE abortions are not recorded or reported at all. you're right, someone is not telling the truth about their intent. i'd say the senator who wrote this bill is pretty forthcoming.

Very interesting. I wonder what they are doing today that reports abortions after 22 weeks, but doesn't report abortions before 22 weeks? Surely, you would think they could do the same thing that they are doing now, only have physicians report ALL abortions, before and after the 22 week period. That would give us the numbers we are looking for, while at the same time protecting the privacy of the women involved.

That to me seems like a much more logical solution.

well now you said something that makes sense. it's just as (but not more so) logical.

EXCEPT that as i've already pointed out, the women's privacy is still protected even when a death certificate is issued. the difference is, that a death certificate would recognize and acknowledge the fact that it was a human life.

still doesn't "brand", "letter", "shame", "violate privacy" or otherwise discriminate against the mother. at least, not as the bill is currently written. if they ammend the bill to include any of those things, please let me know.