| FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE April 15, 2020 |
CONTACT: Mallory Quigley [email protected] |
Washington, D.C. – Pro-life leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate have sent three letters to the Trump administration advocating for the protection of unborn children and their mothers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Two letters led by Representative Doug Lamborn (CO-05) and Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS) call for continued enforcement of the President’s regulations on fetal tissue research. Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS) and Representative Bob Latta (OH-05) sent a bicameral letter to FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn urging the FDA to uphold and enforce the Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (REMS) associated with chemical abortions.
SBA List President Marjorie Dannenfelser praised these letters, issuing the following comment:
“As millions of Americans work together to fight the coronavirus outbreak, the profit-driven abortion industry and their allies exploit fears surrounding the pandemic to promote an extreme abortion agenda. Their calls for the rollback of protective FDA regulations on dangerous chemical abortion drugs, which carry serious risks for women, potentially requiring hospitalization, prove they are willing to endanger not only the health and safety of vulnerable women but that of front-line medical personnel and all of society. Additionally, they insist that unethical experiments involving aborted baby body parts are necessary to find a cure for the coronavirus, ignoring the wide variety of ethical options already available and under development. We are greatly encouraged by the strong leadership of Sen. Wicker, Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, Rep. Lamborn, Rep. Latta, and all our pro-life allies in Congress who are fighting back against the abortion industry’s attempts to exploit this national pandemic to advance their dangerous agenda.”
Despite claims that chemical abortion is the safe, easy, near painless way to have an abortion, research shows that as many as five to seven percent of women who take the abortion pill will require follow-up surgery.
Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS) stated:
“Representative Latta and I, with many of our colleagues, believe the FDA must maintain strict enforcement of the REMS for abortion drugs. With hospitals pushed to their limits by the COVID-19 health emergency, we should minimize, not increase, unrelated pressures on health care providers.”
The New York Times editorial board recently called for chemical abortion to be made widely accessible through telemedicine in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Washington Post suggested that the Trump administration’s ban on fetal tissue research was inhibiting medical professionals in finding a cure for COVID-19.
Representative Doug Lamborn (CO-05) commented:
“During this crisis, the last thing anyone should do is try and advance the left’s radical abortion agenda. Life is precious at all stages and any claim to the contrary is unconscionable. We will find a cure for the current coronavirus, but using tissue from aborted babies to do so is unethical and wrong. I’m thankful that President Trump has taken such a strong stand for life, and I’m confident a solution can be found while also maintaining the sanctity of life.”
Recently, more than 50 pro-life leaders of national and state-based groups sent a letter to U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar calling on all public health officials to oppose the promotion of abortion amidst our national response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
SBA List is a network of more than 837,000 pro-life Americans nationwide, dedicated to ending abortion by electing national leaders and advocating for laws that save lives, with a special calling to promote pro-life women leaders.
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