News

WASHINGTON, DC, May 10, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Two House committees have issued letters to state agencies in their efforts to prevent more abortion facility atrocities akin to Dr. Kermit Gosnell’s “House of Horrors.” 

Kermit Gosnell, who is on trial for five counts of murder, four of which involved infants who survived his abortion attempts only to be killed after birth, is awaiting his verdict in a Pennsylvania court. 

Gosnell was allowed to operate his clinic for years without ever underoing an inspection after pro-choice former Gov. Tom Ridge suspended all inspection of abortion clinics, allegedly for purely political reasons.

The House Committee on Energy and Commerce sent a letter this week to every state health department requesting information regarding the rules, regulations, and methods of monitoring abortion facilities the means of enforcing those regulations. 

“[T]he Grand Jury Report filed by the Pennsylvania District Attorney investigating Dr. Gosnell found that ‘Pennsylvania’s Department of Health has deliberately chosen not to enforce laws that should afford patients at abortion clinics the same safeguards and assurances of quality health care as patients of other medical service providers,” the letter from the Congresional points out. “Even nail salons are monitored more closely for client safety.’” 

The letter asks for details such as frequency of inspections, methods for handling complaints, number and nature of violations, number and nature of disciplinary actions. 

Click “like” if you are PRO-LIFE!

Image

“Planned Parenthood called Gosnell’s ‘House of Horrors’ an ‘outlier,’ but we’re learning Gosnell is not an aberration,” said Energy and Commerce Committee Vice Chairman Marsha Blackburn (R-TN).

Blackburn pointed out that Planned Parenthood has admitted that patients approached them complaining about conditions at Gosnell’s clinic, but the abortion giant did nothing.

“Now we’re discovering that other big abortion businesses refuse to give medical treatment to babies who survive botched abortions and we’re finding out the truth from former pro-choice nurses who called their own Gosnell-like clinics ‘ridiculously unsafe’ where ‘meat-market style of assembly-line abortions’ happen,” said Blackburn. 

“Oversight and enforcement are desperately needed so we can help stop these Gosnell scenarios from continuing.”

The House Judiciary Committee also sent a letter to state attorneys general this week requesting information about state laws governing the operation of abortion facilities and each state’s treatment of the federal Born-Alive Infants Protection Act.  It asks if the “deliberate killing of newborns” is treated as a criminal offense and, if so, details of any prosecutions of such a crime.  It also asks whether each state has laws regarding late term abortions and, if so, what methods for enforcement are in place. 

Kermit Gosnell, in addition to murder charges, is also facing charges for multiple illegal late-term abortions committed after the state cut-off of 24 weeks gestation.  

“Kermit Gosnell is the tip of the iceberg,” said Susan B. Anthony list’s Marjorie Dannenfelser said. “Two former employees have blown the whistle on ‘meat market-style assembly line abortions’ at Planned Parenthood of Delaware. Hollywood-celebrated late-term abortionist Leroy Carhart has been caught on tape calling babies in the womb ‘meat in a crock pot.’”

She added, “The inhumanity of the abortion industry has never been clearer and now it’s time for America to see how deep this lack of respect for life goes.”

“Congress must address the multi-state breakdown of oversight in the abortion industry as well as the barbarism of abortions performed on children capable of feeling pain and surviving outside the womb.”

None of the state agencies receiving the letter is legally obligated to respond.  However, the committee does have subpoena power it can use if necessary.