By the Numb-ers

I was half listening to the news last night and there was a whole lotta coverage about the Texas AR-15 who executed a whole bunch of people in a house and managed to get away. Children survived this massacre because mothers threw themselves over their children. 

The cops were almost surprised the kids were alive. You see, when a bullet from an AR-15 goes through you, it's probably not one bullet, more like 30 based on how fast the gun fires. And they leave a big, gaping exit wound. If you really wanna know, watch this: AMERICAN ICON THE BLAST EFFECT This is how bullets from an AR-15 blow the body apart. 

From GUN VIOLENCE ARCHIVE

That's why it was so hard to identify the kids at Sandy Hook. There wasn't much left to recognize. 

In April alone, there were 54 mass shootings. That's more than one-a-day. 57 people were killed, 247 were injured. Most of the mass shootings since 2012 involve AR-15 rifles. 

Still not convinced? On March 29th, Senator Dick Durban (D-IL) addressed the Senate Judiciary Committee on the subject. He was beyond eloquent . [Click the link above to listen to his speech. It's devastating.] 

"The events this week in Nashville, Tennessee, are still fresh in our minds.  The thought that a shooter went on the campus of a Christian school, a school for children, little children, this person who went on that campus blasted her way into the building and then took the lives of three, nine-year-old children and three adults… It is heartbreaking to think that we are reliving this scene over and over again where our children who are sent by their loving parents off to school, lunches in hand, never came home. Never. Came. Home.”  

I believe it's pretty safe to say the response is sponsored by the GOP and their handlers, the NRA. Wanna read what they have to say about "Assault Weapons" / "Large" Magazines," folks. Read it for yourselves.  Try not to vomit into your coffee cup. 

No other western country allows this kind of stuff to happen. 

And speaking of other countries, the march of death does not end with guns....it extends to women across this country...and I'm not even talking about actual abortions here. I'm talking about access to reproductive health care in general. 

Maternal Mortality ratios

This is about maternal mortality. That's when a new mother dies shortly after giving birth. It's really a function of lack of prenatal and postnatal health care. One would think in a country that claims to have the best health care in the world, we wouldn't be falling somewhere between Palestine and China. Actually, there are 84 countries on the list, and the US ranks 65th. Not exactly a good position, eh? 

But it's not a surprise either. In February, the NY Times posted an article about rural communities lacking labor and delivery facilities.  

From 2015 to 2019, there were at least 89 obstetric unit closures in rural hospitals across the country. By 2020, about half of rural community hospitals did not provide obstetrics care, according to the American Hospital Association.

The number of hospitals providing that service since 2020 has dwindled even further. And in states where abortion is completely banned, creating a moral dilemma for obstetricians, midwives, and doulas, professionals are departing in droves, leaving women to travel excessive distances to get any sort of care. Emergency care is almost non-existent. According to a variety of sources, rural women who live in an obstetrical desert are 3-times more likely to die during and in the year following pregnancy. 

Idaho, like other states that have criminalized abortion, finds itself with fewer medical students willing to come to a state where they can be prosecuted for providing certain levels of care for women. Boise State Public Radio examined the issue  making it very clear that the impact of criminalization has a massive rolling impact on medical accessibility. Dr. Ted Epperly, director of Full Circle Health in Idaho said:

“Today, it's around abortion care,” he said. “Tomorrow, it may be around gender-affirming care. The day after tomorrow, what could it potentially be about as well?”

Black, Indigenous, and Latina women who live outside of urban centers are at even greater risk. Often un- or underinsured, they go without any prenatal care at all. If they are living in rural areas, not only is there no guarantee a hospital within driving distance will even offer labor and delivery services, putting both mother and child into the high risk category.  Without access to reproductive health care, birth control is not necessarily available, and by extension, an increase in pregnancies will occur. 

What part of this is pro-life? 

Y'know, it may not be the most popular or obvious extension of this particular highway, but does anyone remember all the accusations and assertions made by the GOP that Democrats were practicing eugenics by allowing abortion on demand? That abortion would allow/encourage people to have "designer" babies? That gender determination would cause people to abort an "undesirable" gender/trait? Folks, there are still people out there that believe that stuff is what abortion is about. Never mind the life of the mother when an ectopic pregnancy occurs, or an embryo is so malformed that it is incompatible with life. Those tenuous life forms are now protected in some states, regardless of the health of the embryo or the mother because some jackass thinks it's killing a designer baby.

PBS Newshour did an interesting piece on what's going on in Idaho: Idaho’s strict abortion laws create uncertainty for OB-GYNs in the state. They interviewed both medical professionals and law makers. From the show:

Sarah Varney:

State Representative Mark Sauter, a Republican, lives in Sandpoint. He says he hadn't thought much about the abortion ban.

 

State Rep. Mark Sauter:

It really wasn't high on my radar, other than I'm a pro-life guy, and I ran that way, but I didn't see it as it had a real — having a real big community impact.

 

Sarah Varney:

Then he started talking with local doctors, including Amelia Huntsberger.

 

What I'm wondering is, for you personally, did you think about abortion as it relates to obstetric care for pregnant women?

 

State Rep. Mark Sauter:

No, I don't think I — it's like anything. You get exposed to something and, all of a sudden, you go, wow, there's a different way to look at this. You know, what are we going to do about all this?

 

Sarah Varney:

So, is Bonner the canary in a cold line in the coal mine?

 

State Rep. Mark Sauter:

It could be.

 

Sarah Varney:

With Sandpoint's maternity ward closing, Representative Sauter supported a bill that would have allowed doctors to terminate pregnancies to protect a woman's health, not just prevent her death. But that effort was shot down by other Republicans.

What struck me is that this guy, State Rep. Mark Sauter, knew nothing about women's health care yet he felt qualified to initially vote on a life and death topic. I think that speaks volumes for the core of the problem. Idaho is not the only state where uninformed, uneducated penises are making decisions as if we are living in the 18th or even the 19th century. 

And here's the last piece on the numbers: if you look at the maternal mortality list, you will notice that just about every country but one improved their maternal mortality numbers since 2017. Wanna guess which country got worse?

You can call yourselves pro-life all you want, but these numbers don't lie. 

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week

We lost another mensch last week: Harry Belafonte.

If you want to give yourself a moment of glee, go listen to CALYPSO.

It's totally joyful.