Assembly moves fast on abortion bills

The Assembly Committee on Health plans to vote Thursday on abortion-related proposals that got a public hearing Tuesday. The full chamber could take up the measures as early as next week.

One of the measures would require that doctors provide the same level of care to children born alive after an attempted abortion as they would for any other child. A separate bill would ban abortions based on a child’s sex, race or a disability diagnosis.

Another proposal would require doctors to tell women who take abortion pills that they can continue the pregnancy once starting the regimen. And two nearly identical bills would bar Planned Parenthood from the Medicaid program. Lawmakers say they’re trying to find a compromise on the two.

Rep. Jim Steineke, R-Kaukauna, pushed back against Democratic lawmakers who said that current law already requires doctors to provide care to children who survive abortion attempts. He questioned why Democrats would oppose the measure.

“Do you disagree with the fact that a baby born after abortion should be given care?” he asked. “Do you disagree with the fact that a baby that survives abortion should not be murdered by that doctor?”

Dr. Kathy Hartke, legislative co-chair of the Wisconsin section of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, said her organization “strongly denounces the rhetoric that has been used to promote the bills.”

“The idea that physicians deliver and then kill or neglect treating a viable fetus is unfounded and dangerous misinformation,” she said.

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