A Texas committee that is meant to review pregnancy-related deaths in the state won’t review cases from 2022 and 2023, the Washington Post reported. That means that pregnancy-related deaths since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade with the Dobbs decision won’t be reviewed in the state. In Texas, doctors who violate the state’s strict abortion ban face up to 99 years in prison. According to ProPublica, at least three women have died in Texas due to delays in care related to the state’s abortion bans.
According to the report, Texas Maternal Mortality and Morbidity Review Committee members said in September the change was made to “be more contemporary.”
The move has reportedly left some committee members confused and full of concern.
“If women are dying because of delays, and we have this huge new policy in Texas that affects their lives, why would we skip over those years?” one member of the Texas maternal mortality committee said, speaking on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retribution, told The Post. “I’m worried.”
According to the report, none of the members interviewed by The Post said they heard the decision was an attempt to cover up potential deaths related to abortion bans. The committee has skipped over previous years as well, the report stated.
According to the most recent data on maternal mortality rates in Texas, women who died while pregnant, during labor and delivery, or in the year after giving birth increased in 2020 and 2021. As The Post explained, experts have suspected that the COVID-19 pandemic could have contributed to the rise in deaths, in addition to the abortion ban the state passed in the second half of 2021. According to a separate investigation in JAMA Pediatrics, the number of newborn babies dying in Texas increased by 13% since the state's near-total abortion ban went into effect.
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