Anna Franzonello of AUL wrote about Mississippi’s abortion regulations at The Corner at National Review Online.
An excerpt:
Last week, the Daily Beast wanted readers to “meet the woman in charge of the last abortion clinic in Mississippi.” Why the introduction to Diane Derzis, who “embraces the moniker” of “abortion queen”? Her clinic was facing closure for failing to be in compliance with a new Mississippi law.
The piece falls short of helping us to make a true acquaintance, glossing over critical pieces of information for anyone who wants to get to know Derzis and what motivates her. The “abortion queen” is no altruistic champion of women. Derzis, quite literally, profits from abortion. And her Mississippi clinic is not the first to face closure for endangering women’s health.
While the article shares several irrelevant details about Derzis including that she “loves yard sales, [and] thrillers to take her mind off tough days” it makes no effort to describe what is only vaguely referred to as “the law” that threatened to close her clinic. Understandably, Derzis’s failure to meet a health and safety standard designed to protect abortion patients does not exactly fit with the gosh-don’t-you-love-her-and-her-smoker’s-laugh theme. However, a serious piece of journalism would have tackled the issue, not created a sideshow.
The Mississippi law requires that doctors at abortion clinics have admitting privileges at a local hospital. Why? To ensure that women have continued care in the face of an emergency. Abortion is an invasive surgical procedure that can lead to numerous and serious medical complications. Far from being a “small-bore but potent restriction,” as the Daily Beast would have readers believe, abortion-clinic regulations, such as Mississippi’s admitting-privileges requirement that Derzis’s clinic fails to comply with, are designed to meet the medical needs of patients and protect women from abortion providers who would place profit over health and safety.
Instead of addressing the merits of the law, the Daily Beast praises Derzis’s for things like her “knack for design.” Readers are told that the clinic’s waiting room is painted with bright purples and yellows, and that red leather furniture helps create a “happy, warm feeling.” According to Derzis, “the ambience of the clinic . . . goes a long way.”
Bright colors and plush chairs may help Derzis sell more abortions, but they do absolutely nothing to ensure the health of her patients. The fact that “her home with its Jacuzzi tub and skyline view was featured in a Birmingham paper recently” suggests Derzis’s business is personally lucrative but offers no assurance that the women who walk into her clinic will go home safely.
Read the whole thing here.
