Rose Casey, Morgantown
When West Virginia goes to the vote in November, Amendment 1 will be on the ballot. If passed, this amendment will ban abortion in absolutely all cases — even if the pregnant woman were to die.
Is this who we want to be? A place that sentences pregnant women experiencing life-threatening medical complications to their deaths?
In May of this year, Ireland voted overwhelmingly to overturn its ban on abortion. This deeply moral, religious and traditional country came to its decision after a young woman, Savita Halappanavar, died in 2012 from complications from a miscarriage.
Under the existing law, doctors were forbidden from giving her medical treatment that would have saved her life.
Like Ireland, we can recognize that abortion is a medical procedure that needs to remain legal. If abortion is banned, women will die from difficult pregnancies.
They will be forced to carry a fetus to term after being raped. They will be refused an abortion even in cases of incest. Amendment 1 is an extremist and inhumane bill. We are better than this.
