Rafael Romo of CNN is reporting that the pregnant 16-year-old leukemia patient in the Dominican Republic, who was initially denied medical treatment because of the possible impact on her unborn child, has died. Doctors delayed chemotherapy treatment some 20 days after the teen was admitted to the hospital because doctors worried that treatment might terminate the pregnancy, which is a violation of the Dominican Republic’s anti-abortion laws. Eventually, the girl began receiving treatment but her body did not respond. She later suffered a miscarriage and died from cardiac arrest. The case has become a focal point in the abortion debate because critics maintained that the teen’s life was put at risk for a pregnancy in its 13th week. The girl’s mother Rosa Hernandez believes that the teen’s life should have been spared. Rafael Romo writes:
“At the time the treatment started, Rosa Hernandez, the girl’s mother, said she tried to convince doctors and the Dominican government to make an exception so that her daughter’s life could be saved.” Romo reports that Hernandez said, “My daughter’s life is first. I know that (abortion) is a sin and that it goes against the law … but my daughter’s health is first.”
Instead of one dead child, there are now two.
Read more at CNN.
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[…] intervention. This issue is particularly pertinent in light of the worldwide attention on the teenager who died in the Dominican Republic after an abortion ban after being denied treatment for leukemia due to a pregnancy. The tragic consequences of […]
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