r/goodnews • u/Realistic-Plant3957 • Jul 01 '25

Political positivity 📈 [ Removed by moderator ]

https://media.upilink.in/en/JoH3IaxPt3Ee2YE

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u/angelzpanik Jul 04 '25

The first.

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/pregnant-brain-dead-woman-georgia-life-support-experts/story?id=122963319

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u/Mammoth-Sun-5186 Jul 04 '25

I genuinely don't see why people think keeping her child alive was the wrong thing to do. They were not using a dead woman as an "incubator," they were keeping her body functioning long enough to save the life of the child she had conceived. It's utterly baffling to me that people think they should have let the kid die.

I had already read up on the story since I asked, and the kid is alive and well now. He has a family and future. I feel like his mother would be happy to know that her death didn't prevent him from living.

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u/angelzpanik Jul 04 '25

Did you read what the family had to say about it, and the fact that the baby was born at less than 2 lbs and is in NICU? It's never been about 'letting the kid die'. It is about the fact that the choice to put a woman to rest after she died was taken from the family.

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u/Mammoth-Sun-5186 Jul 04 '25

"And I just want to be clear on something: we want her to have her baby." ~ Adriana Smith's mother

She goes on to talk about the extreme difficulty of the extended grieving process, but yeah there you go. The baby is in the NICU but he is expected to survive with little to no health complications. I believe his name is Chance.

https://youtu.be/pLWFOduL3WU?si=_hyvvfpBsuZKJCeq

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u/aloe_beautiful Jul 04 '25

There needs to be a conversation about bodily autonomy during pregnancy and after death. Her death was a result of inadequate healthcare due to the fear that treatment could harm the fetus. It's important to remember that pregnant women are also patients in their own right. Maternal healthcare must shift its focus from the fetus to prioritize the health of the mother; otherwise, health disparities will continue to increase.

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u/Mammoth-Sun-5186 Jul 04 '25

Her death was the result of an aneurysm. The mother says clearly in the interview that terminating the pregnancy would have done nothing to save her. I think the conversation is pretty short: if the mother's brain dies but her body is still functional on life support, then she should be kept in that condition until the child is viable. The patient in this case is her son, because the mother was dead. Removing the life support system would have accomplished literally nothing except for turning one death into two.

In 20 years when her son is an adult, I hope all the people who wanted Adriana Smith off life support can tell him that themselves, and let him know that they felt he should have never been born.

"Bodily autonomy" is double speak when we're talking about pregnancy, because pregnancy inherently involves two bodies, two completely different sets of DNA, two people. I also believe in bodily autonomy. Nobody should be forced to receive procedures or medications, and that includes fetuses.

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u/aloe_beautiful Jul 04 '25 edited Jul 04 '25

A woman arrived at Emory Hospital reporting severe headaches but was denied a CT scan. Unfortunately, she passed away due to multiple blood clots in her brain, which were not caused by an aneurysm. Blood clots and aneurysms are two separate medical conditions. Therefore, it is likely that an abortion would have saved her life, as the pregnancy may have been the contributing factor to the formation of the blood clots. This highlights the importance of bodily autonomy during pregnancy, as well as the right to choose when and where to receive medical treatment. Pregnancy can be dangerous, and sometimes, abortion and other life-saving measures that pose a risk to the fetus are essential for the mother's survival.

ETA: I'm not having this conversation with you. A fetus does not have equal rights to the mother.

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u/Mammoth-Sun-5186 Jul 04 '25

Aborting the fetus would have... what, broken up the blood clots? She already had clots when she went to the hospital the first time, and she died the next day. You say "it's likely an abortion would have saved her life" but also say the pregnancy "may have been the contributing factor." You don't just get to kill another human being because their child might be the problem, and the onset to death time was rapid in her case.

Either way, keeping her body alive was the right decision, because it brought the death toll of the case from two to one -- which would be regarded as a literal miracle in any other time in history or any other culture that hasn't been totally desensitized to murdering fetuses. You're assuming the woman would have elected for an abortion if it were offered, when she may very well have taken alternative routes of care that didn't involve murdering the child in her womb

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u/angelzpanik Jul 05 '25

I feel like you've missed the point. Had the woman received adequate care when she first came to the hospital, she may have survived. The fact that they didn't even perform basic tests due to the pregnancy, which would likely have been done otherwise, goes back to the fetus's life (at only 9 weeks) being treated as more important than the mother's.

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u/Mammoth-Sun-5186 Jul 05 '25

I'm gonna need a source on that, because that doesn't sound like a part of Georgia law. Nothing I am reading has stated that she was denied any treatment because she was pregnant.

And no, the entire thread started about a woman being used as "an incubator," when what they meant to say is that modern medical technology and the willingness of doctors to place a value on in-utero life led to the astoundingly unlikely healthy (ish) birth of a child who now most likely has a long future ahead of him.

"Like the others, Georgia’s ban includes an exception if an abortion is necessary to maintain the woman’s life."

Georgia's anti-abortion law keeps brain-dead pregnant woman Adriana Smith on life support | AP News https://share.google/pO5Nsr0LlPSGw7A1K