On the recordSeptember 21, 2015
tomorrow this Chamber will vote on something called the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, legislation I have cosponsored, that would recognize that a women has a legal right to have an abortion up to the point of 5 months' gestation; that is, after 5 months' gestation, an unborn child is beginning to grow hair on their head, their fingernails are growing. By this time in development, mothers are beginning to feel the baby kicking and moving for the very first time. In other words, this is the point at which the child literally becomes viable, becomes a human being, capable of life outside of the mother. Obviously, a typical period of pregnancy is 40 weeks. So obviously we hope that in most cases a child will remain in the womb until it is fully developed. But the fact is, talk to any neonatologist, talk to any physician, they will tell you that at a point around 20 weeks, certainly 5 months of gestation, you have no longer a child dependent upon their mother for life but somebody who can actually live independently. Indeed, as many of us have done, go into some of these nurseries, where they have literally babies who weigh 1 pound or less, and see what medical science is able to do to actually save the lives of these premature babies--in a way that will allow them to grow up and be healthy and productive. It is nothing less than a medical miracle.…
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