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May 29, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) – American governors who have subjected the abortion industry to the same emergency restrictions imposed on actual medical fields have been “manipulating” the coronavirus crisis to undermine women’s “rights,” claims a group of so-called “experts” from the United Nations.

Advice from medical authorities led governors across the United States to order the temporary suspension of all or most “non-urgent” health appointments and elective medical procedures, both to limit the spread of COVID-19 and to free up time and resources to focus on infected patients. Some expressly included surgical abortions, to the abortion industry’s chagrin.

Those states “appear to be manipulating the crisis to severely restrict women’s reproductive rights,” claims Elizabeth Broderick, Vice Chair of the UN Working Group on Discrimination against Women and Girls. “We fear that, without clear political will to reverse such restrictive and regressive trends, states will continue pursuing this pattern.”

“Abortion care [sic] constitutes essential health care and must remain available during the COVID-19 crisis,” she continued. “Restrictions on access to comprehensive reproductive health information and services, including abortion as well as contraception, constitute human rights violations and can cause irreversible harm, in particular to low-income women and those belonging to racial minorities and immigrant communities.”

Broderick also responded to the Trump administration’s recent declaration that “there is no international right to abortion, nor is there any duty on the part of States to finance or facilitate abortion.” Therefore, the Trump administration insisted, “we do not accept references to ‘sexual and reproductive health,’ or other language that suggests or explicitly states that access to abortion is included in the provision of population and individual level health services.”

“Removing references to sexual and reproductive health from the HRP will have devastating consequences for women worldwide,” Broderick claimed. “It will seriously undermine the international community’s joint effort to respond to women’s health needs in this time of crisis.”

Pro-lifers argue the opposite is the case.

“Elective abortion, both surgical and drug induced, also generates more patients to be seen in already overburdened emergency rooms,” the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists (AAPLOG) says. “Most abortion providers instruct women to go to an emergency room if they have any concerning symptoms after the abortion. Approximately five percent of women who undergo medication abortions will require evaluation in an emergency room, most commonly for hemorrhage. Surgical abortions can also result in hemorrhage. Emergency room personnel – who are already struggling to meet the demands of the COVID-19 pandemic – will be further strained to provide care to these women.”

“The US government strongly disagrees with the characterisations and conclusions expressed in this statement and rejects any attempt to use the COVID-19 pandemic as a way to assert that there is an international right to abortion,” the US mission to the UN in Geneva responded Thursday. “At a time when there are many documented cases of human rights abuses of women and girls during the pandemic, it would behoove the working group's representatives to focus on these real human rights abuses.”

Planned Parenthood is currently preparing a $5 million campaign to bombard election battleground states with advertising against state efforts to suspend elective abortions as part of coronavirus emergency measures.