Abortion: Clinics needed for women's safety

Re: “Louisiana abortion clinics brace for Supreme Court ruling” (TNT, 2-27).

I started the practice of medicine 23 years before Roe vs. Wade (1973). There were two small Catholic hospitals in the California town where I practiced.

In 10 years of practice I saw fewer than 10 women who presented themselves as emergencies with hemorrhages from attempted abortions. The hospitals received them without questions. One patient had dangerous complications. They varied in age from 18 to 40.

Induction of their labor was by amateurs and paid nonmedical people who could perform the abortion in a motel room.

The public must be made aware of how easy and dangerous it is for rank amateurs to induce bleeding, setting the stage for an abortion. Outlawing clinics for these helpless women makes no sense.

This story was originally published February 29, 2016 at 10:21 AM with the headline "Abortion: Clinics needed for women's safety."