Pro-Life Advocates Applaud Trend in Passing Abortion-Ultrasound Bills 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
May 24, 2007
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — Abortion involves the ending of the life of a baby before birth and sometimes involves the use of an ultrasound before the abortion procedure is carried out. Shouldn’t women be entitled to see what the abortion involves and whose life will be taken in the process?
That’s the thought of pro-life advocates and the legislatures of 10 states that have approved legislation allowing women to see an ultrasound before the abortion is done.
They’ve been used in pregnancy centers for many years and women who go there and see the development of their unborn child almost always opt against having an abortion afterwards.
And, nowadays, parents can head down to their local mall and go to an ultrasound imaging store to purchase their first baby pictures of their boy or girl doing somersaults in the womb weeks or months before they hold the child in their arms.
With that kind of track record, pro-life advocates say it makes plenty of sense to give women the chance to see an ultrasound with the hopes of encouraging them to choose alternatives to abortion.
Mary Spaulding Balch, an attorney with the National Right to Life Committee, tracks state legislation and for years has helped states across the country put pro-life laws into place that are helping women and saving lives.
"This truly represents a trend among the states to provide a woman with all possible information before she makes a decision that will greatly affect her life and take the life of her unborn child," Balch told LifeNews.com.
Those comments came after Georgia governor Sonny Perdue made his state the tenth to give women the opportunity to view the ultrasound — something most abortion centers fail allow her to see.
Mississippi and Idaho both enacted similar laws earlier this legislative session. The other seven states are Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Michigan, Oklahoma, Utah and Wisconsin.
Additionally, Louisiana requires that, for abortions at twenty or more weeks gestation, an ultrasound be performed and that the woman be offered the opportunity to view the image and lawmakers there are hoping to expand that access.
Susan Armacost, the legislative director of Wisconsin Right to Life, applauded Georgia for joining the list.
"It is vital to provide a woman, who is considering an abortion, with all pertinent information," she said. "Abortion is an irreversible, life-changing decision and women deserve to have all the facts."
Other states could follow on the heels of Georgia and Wisconsin as some 32 state have informed consent or Right to Know laws no the books that give women information about abortion’s risks and alternatives.
Most of those statutes contain information on fetal development that the state requires abortion practitioners to give women and many of those states could easily add viewing an ultrasound in their informed consent statute.
That’s something Balch told LifeNews.com she hopes will happen.
"Ultrasound is the window to the womb and allows women to see their unborn child," Balch concluded. "We urge other states to join this trend and protect women and their unborn children."
