How to prevent another Gosnell: Column

Amanda Marcotte | USATODAY

After a lengthy trial and deliberations, a Philadelphia jury found Dr. Kermit Gosnell guilty of three counts of murder and one count of manslaughter. Gosnell had long been operating a clinic described by many as a "house of horrors" where he exploited desperate, often very poor women by performing unsafe, often illegal abortions and, as the prosecutors successfully argued, sometimes by delivering live babies and murdering them in his offices. His crimes have been thoroughly denounced by both anti-abortion and pro-choice folks.

Of course, the question lurking on everyone's minds is, "How can we prevent future tragedies like this?" Anti-choicers have suggested that what is needed is to pass more unnecessary regulations of abortion clinics that do more to shut down safe, legal clinics than they do to make abortion safer for women. Pennsylvania is chock-a-block full of those kinds of regulations -- the state has been graded an F by NARAL in terms of support for safe, legal abortion -- but none of these regulations that make safe abortion hard to get, expensive and time-consuming did anything to stop Gosnell.

Indeed, if we want to prevent future Gosnells, the solution is simple: Abortion should be regulated, of course, but in the same way that all other medical practice is regulated, with an eye towards making it safe, not making it hard to get. One of the main reasons Gosnell was able to operate in the first place was that he preyed on women who felt that they couldn't get better abortion services elsewhere. At least one patient told reporters that she feared going to Planned Parenthood because of the protesters. Gosnell mostly exploited women's poverty, undercutting reputable clinics on their prices. For many women in poverty, getting the money together for a clean, safe abortion takes a long time, often so long that they are past the time when they can legally get one. Gosnell was waiting to scoop those women up and subject them and their families to his violent parody of medical care.

If we want to prevent future Gosnells, the solution is simple: Support good abortion providers. Help women who want abortions get them quickly and inexpensively. Repeal federal and state legislation that prevents Medicaid and insurance companies from covering abortion, so women don't have to scramble to pay for it. These simple measures will help make sure women who don't want to continue their pregnancies can get into clinics early and be treated with dignity and care. It will keep sadists and psychopaths like Gosnell from lurking in the underground, waiting to pounce on women who turn to them because they believe they have nowhere else to go.

Amanda Marcotte writes about politics and pop culture at the American Prospect and Slate's XX Factor.

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