by Bonnie Finnerty, Education Director

Governor Tom Wolf has enacted far-reaching measures to protect the most vulnerable from Covid-19, closing schools, places of worship, and non-essential businesses for weeks. Citizens are sacrificing freedoms and finances for a greater good.

Yet, while stay-at-home orders have been issued for the entire state, Wolf allows the eviction of some from their first home in their mother’s wombs.  Amidst the myriad of closures, abortion centers remain open.

The irony is tragically rich and the hypocrisy blatant. Abortion essential? A life-sustaining business? Isn’t it quite the opposite?

And now, Wolf recklessly promises to veto Senate Bill 857, the Telemedicine Bill, because it prohibits dangerous abortion pills being dispensed via phone or video.

These are women who would not have been examined by a physician. Women who don’t know exactly how far along they are. Women who may have an ectopic pregnancy, or multiple pregnancies, or high blood pressure, or other complicating factors.

Wolf somehow believes it is “life-sustaining” to prescribe a pill that will starve a growing baby and then expel it. Does he realize there could be hemorrhaging or baby parts left behind or a dozen other scenarios that necessitate a trip to a hospital emergency room or that could jeopardize a woman’s life? Does he realize the trauma a woman may endure when holding her own lifeless child in her hands?

By insisting abortion drugs be included in a telemedicine bill, he contradicts the recommendation of the FDA.

So protective of access to abortion, Wolf is willing to trade every Pennsylvanians’ access to telemedicine for it, revealing an incredibly inconsistent life ethic.

If he believes in sustaining life, he should stop supporting those who steal it.

He should close the abortion centers and promote life-sustaining options to women facing difficult pregnancies.

And he should not hold health care hostage to the powerful, profitable abortion lobby.