The state of Georgia passed a law making abortion illegal once a fetal heartbeat can be heard, which is about 6 weeks. Among the punishments are up to 99 years in prison for a woman terminating her pregnancy, 10 years if she seeks the procedure out of state and the death penalty for anyone performing an abortion. This bill also gives an embryo personhood status. An embryo with the same status as a walking human being. Really?
Imagine you are a technician working in a lab, alone, late at night in a fertility clinic. There is an explosion. You run to the door, look left and see fire quickly spreading. You go right, running down the hallway toward the front of the building. The fire is racing up the hallway behind you. You hear the scream of a toddler. Racing along, you peek inside the open doorways until you come to a room where a toddler is curled up in the left corner screaming. There is a glass jar in the right corner clearly marked 100 embryos. You barely have time to run to one corner and still escape.
Which corner do you run to? Do you save the crying toddler or the 100 persons in the glass jar?
NANCY HEATH
Epsom