“Twila” underwent a legal first-trimester abortion in either 1974 or 1975. Her death was counted by the CDC as a death from legal abortion.
Twila was at greater risk than most women because of an unspecified congenital heart disease. This may have played a role in the reasoning behind the abortion as well as surgical sterilization by laparotomy. She may have mistakenly believed that the abortion would save her life instead of ending it.
At 11 weeks pregnant, Twila underwent the surgical abortion in a hospital under general anesthesia. She did not survive.
Despite Twila’s lifelong cardiac condition, it was not any pre-existing disease that killed her. She died of a suspected cerebral embolism. This horrifying injury occurred when air, amniotic fluid, blood clots, particles of placenta or even tiny shreds of her dead child’s body entered her bloodstream and blocked an artery to the head, depriving her brain of blood and oxygen.
Fam Plan Persp. 1981 Jan—Feb
Comparative Risk of Death in hospitals and nonhospital facilities
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