By now you have probably heard that Texas health officials are moving to require that fetal remains be buried or cremated. Texas is following the lead of Indiana, which imposed a similar requirement last year.<\/p>\n
According to the Washington Post<\/a>:<\/p>\n Abortion providers generally\u00a0use third-party special waste services to\u00a0dispose of fetal\u00a0remains.\u00a0Previous\u00a0rules [in Texas] allowed fetal\u00a0remains, along with other medical tissue, to be ground up and discharged into a sewer system, incinerated, or handled by some other approved process before being disposed of in a landfill.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I have questions. Is it sanitary to dispose of medical tissues by grinding them up and piping them into a sewer system, or by disposing of them in a landfill? I\u2019m completely uneducated on how medical waste is handled, but that sounds sketch to my lay ears.<\/p>\n Texas health officials appear to share my concern:<\/p>\n The health commission has said the rules will result in \u201cenhanced protection of the health and safety of the public.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n But wait. If that\u2019s the case, why do the new requirements only cover fetal tissue? If this is a public health issue, shouldn\u2019t it cover all medical tissue and medical waste products? And that, quite frankly, is the core of the problem here. I am a-okay with state health agencies setting sanitary requirements for the handling of medical tissue and medical waste to promote public health and safety. That\u2019s their job. But that\u2019s not what this is. In regulating fetal tissue differently from other medical tissue, Texas health officials are belying their claimed health and safety\u00a0motivation.<\/p>\n Texas Governor Greg Abbot was not shy about this in his own remarks:<\/p>\n With little notice, Gov. Greg Abbott (R) approved the proposal, saying that he does not believe fetal remains should be \u201ctreated like medical waste and disposed of in landfills,\u201d the Texas Tribune reported.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Comments like this should shut down any claim that this requirement serves public health and safety needs. Abbott totally okay with non-fetal medical tissue and medical waste being dumped in landfills. This isn\u2019t about medicine, health, or safety. It\u2019s about ideological opposition to abortion. Abbot isn\u2019t alone in admitting this.<\/p>\n \u201cFor far too long, Texas has allowed the most innocent among us to be thrown out with the daily waste,\u201d state Sen. Don Huffines (R-Dallas) said in a packed public hearing on the proposed rule in August,\u00a0the Austin American-Statesman reported.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Let\u2019s be very clear about what we\u2019re talking about here. According to the Washington Post, the new requirements apply \u201cregardless of the period of gestation.\u201d In other words, we\u2019re talking first trimester too.<\/p>\n In contrast to the Indiana law, Texas\u2019 requirement is being set by state health officials. I generally prefer to see medical standards set by health officials rather than by the legislature, both because lawmakers are not medical experts and because this\u00a0makes it\u00a0easier to change standards to keep up with new research.<\/p>\n However, this is about to change:<\/p>\n Because the rules fall under the rulemaking authority of the state health department, they do not need legislative approval. But Republican lawmakers have already filed legislation to write the rules into statutory law when the legislature reconvenes in January, the Texas Tribune reported.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n What about miscarriages? Does this requirement apply to them too?<\/p>\n Following\u00a0criticism from medical providers, the state\u2019s Health and Human Services Commission clarified that the requirement does not apply to miscarriages or abortions that take place at home. It also does not require birth or death certificates to be filed, to maintain confidentiality.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Wait wait wait. Birth and death certificates are not required \u201cto maintain confidentiality\u201d? Remember that we\u2019re not just talking about stillbirths here. We\u2019re also talking about first trimester abortions. Unless I missed something big, fetuses are still not persons.<\/p>\n It is, at least, receiving that this bill does not apply to miscarriages or abortions that occur at home. Indiana\u2019s law, which was quickly suspended by a federal judge, was not so picky<\/a>. But this does raise an interesting question\u2014if the concern, as voiced by Abbot and Huffiness, is to ensure that children\u2019s bodies are not thrown out with our medical waste, why make a rule that applies only to abortions or miscarriages that take place in medical facilities?<\/p>\n If the concern is actually about ensuring that fetal remains are disposed of properly, shouldn\u2019t these\u00a0same requirements apply to miscarriages and abortions that take place at home? That the health officials\u2019 new regulations\u00a0apply only to miscarriages or abortions that occur in a medical facivility\u00a0suggests that the requirement is more about burdening abortion clinics than it is about how fetal\u00a0remains are disposed of.<\/p>\n One last point\u2014if\u00a0doctors were refusing to allow women\u00a0who miscarry in a hospital or medical official, or who have a late-term abortion for a wanted pregnancy, to individually\u00a0bury or cremate the remains\u00a0(potentially with\u00a0a small gravesite), I would absolutely have a problem with that. Women should be able to mourn the loss of a child in their own individual need. Not every woman is going to want to go the cremation or burial route, but some will<\/a>. But that\u2019s not what we\u2019re talking about here. We\u2019re talking about the inverse\u2014forcing cremation or burial on every woman who miscarries or aborts in a medical facility\u00a0on every woman\u2014and about extending this requirement to a gestational period\u00a0where there are no visible remains to be seen.<\/p>\n It\u2019s ironic, really, that Republicans spend so much time talking smack about government regulations, but are so happy to make medically unnecessary government regulations to advance their own ideological causes. Republicans are against big government only until they hold the reins of power. Then they\u2019re all for it.<\/p>\n