Pro-Lifers like Herald letter-writer Scott DeBolt (Sept. 2) want only one thing: to make abortion illegal. Perhaps DeBolt is too young to remember the dark days before the legalization of abortion.

Women were still getting abortions. Rich women got D&Cs in antiseptic doctors’ offices, under all sorts of guises other than “pregnancy termination.” Poor women got backroom abortions performed by all sorts of folks – some doctors, some nurses, and many untrained amateurs just in it for a quick $500. Backroom abortions were not performed under sterile conditions and often resulted in horrendous pelvic inflammation/infections as well as internal injuries and bleeding.

Because abortion was illegal, when these women went to the emergency room because of bleeding, fevers above 103 degrees, and were rapidly approaching death, they were regularly denied treatment until they named their abortionist. Many died anyway because treatment was delayed, or simply because they didn’t know or refused to give up the name of the person who performed their abortion, with a coat hanger or whatever other unsterile instrument.

How do I know this? My mother was an ER nurse back in those dark days and saw it firsthand. Eventually the Supreme Court stepped in and said, “Enough!” Women in all walks of life deserve access to safe, sterile medical care, not just the wealthy. Abortion is horrible, it should be the absolute last resort for birth control, but it must remain safe, and legal. I say to DeBolt: never again!

Wade Nelson

Arboles