On November 21, 1924, 24-year-old homemaker Mildred Bleschke died at Chicago's Grant Hospital from complications of an
abortion performed earlier that day. The perpetrator was never
identified.
Keep in mind that things
that things we take for granted, like antibiotics and blood banks, were
still in the future. For more about abortion in this era, see Abortion in the 1920s.
During
the first two thirds of the 20th Century, while abortion was still
illegal, there was a massive drop in maternal mortality, including
mortality from abortion. Most researches attribute this plunge to
improvements in public health and hygiene, the development of blood
transfusion techniques, and the introduction of antibiotics. Learn more here.
On May 30, 1929, 19-year-old Amelia (or Anela) Stumbras died from complications of a criminal abortion. Though the coroner pushed for prosecution, the guilty party was never identified or apprehended.
Given how little information I have about Amelia's death, the only preventability factor is the obvious one of making sure that women know that they are not abandoned to the abortionists. Women who are offered loving support aren't nearly as likely to resort to abortion as women who are left to believe they have no other options. As Planned Parenthood Medical Director Mary Calderone noted in 1960:
"[Planned Parenthood Abortion in America] Conference members agreed, and this was backed up by evidence from the Scandinavians, that when a woman seeking an abortion is given the chance of talking over her problem with a properly trained and oriented person, she will in the process very often resolve many of her qualms and will spontaneously decide to see the pregnancy through, particularly if she is assured that supportive help will continue to be available to her." ("Illegal Abortion as a Public Health Problem," American Journal of Public Health v. 50 no. 7,July 1960)
There is simply no excuse to come between women and hope. And if abortion-rights activists valued women's lives as much as they say they do, they'd stop their drive to keep women away from the people who are willing to offer hope.
