This past Sunday, the Portland Press Herald ran a top story revealing the uncertain future of wind power off of Maine’s coast. If you’ve been paying any attention to the intrigues of the Maine Legislature this past week then you may have also noted that a third trimester, viable, human baby faces an equally uncertain future.

Our state’s Judiciary Committee voted seven to three, along party lines, that LD 1619 “Ought to Pass as Amended.”

LD 1619 is a bill promoted by Gov. Janet Mills in response to the sad situation of Dana Pierce, who discovered her child was suffering from a deadly form of skeletal dysplasia and was unable to obtain a late term abortion in Maine.

As an obstetrician with over 30 years of experience dealing with all manner of complications a pregnancy may present, I believe it’s commendable that Gov. Mills addressed this issue. The condition Ms. Pierce experienced occurs with a frequency of about 2 in 10,000. A specific amendment to the already existing abortion law, here in Maine, could have easily addressed those limited late-term complications of pregnancy.

But, that is not what this amended bill, soon (perhaps) to be law, is set to do.

The proposed amendment is a farce.

The insertion of the simple term “Standard of Care” into the language of the bill was the so-called “amendment” that allowed Democrat members to accept and approve this legislation.

The problem is, those words clarify nothing.

I attended the public hearing on this bill and presented expert testimony against it. I also attended the two work sessions last week and again provided expert testimony, as the sole physician present. The specifics of this bill, certainly as they apply to any actual medical application, were never discussed.

A lobbyist for the Maine Medical Association provided consultation to the committee as did the committee’s own policy expert, yet neither mentioned any guidelines for a Standard of Care in this instance, leaving it to a physician’s opinion to scope out its true meaning.

As the only obstetrician actually present during all of these deliberative proceedings, I know what wasn’t discussed: the specific diagnoses that would be effectively treated by killing a viable baby while still within his/her mother’s uterus.

The genesis of this bill, inducing a delivery of a viable pregnancy that is affected by a lethal anomaly, wasn’t even discussed. Again, I say this so-called amendment is a farce.

Any physician may recommend late term abortion as long as it’s within their professional judgment, and that judgment is within the applicable Standard of Care. This anomalous amendment has offered zero restrictions.

What is the Standard of Care regarding the killing of a viable healthy child within his/her mother’s womb? Is a lethal fetal injection involved? Will there be a birth attendant designated the “fetal reaper” ready to ensure the child’s demise after delivery? Does the Standard of Care for treatment of severe depression include a late term abortion?

It wasn’t discussed.

Maybe Mainers don’t care about LD 1619. Maybe Mainers are more concerned about the uncertain future of coastal windmills than the uncertain future of a viable baby in its third trimester. Based on the conversations I have had, I believe that Mainers just don’t know this bill exists, but when they hear about it, they care.

As a concerned obstetrician, I’d like to know what the Standard of Care is for aborting this farce of a bill during this late legislative term?

Thomas Page, DO, Auburn

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