As a doctor, I know that no two patients are alike. And no two pregnancies are the same.
A pregnancy is, simply put, the body growing another human being inside itself. As a result, pregnancy changes the body in many ways, affecting the heart, brain, muscles and just about every organ. Some patients, happily, experience normal event-free pregnancies. Many, unfortunately, endure complications — in some cases, severe enough that those complications can endanger the patient’s health and put their life at risk.
That’s why in the scope of medicine, abortion is and must remain an option for doctors to consider. And as part of the sacred patient-doctor relation, private medical decisions, including decisions about abortion, should remain between a patient and their trusted doctor, free from political interference.
That’s why Question 6, which protects access to abortions by enshrining this protection in Nevada’s Constitution, is so important. Question 6 ensures patients can get the care they need and prevents politicians from meddling in Nevadans’ most personal decisions.
Physicians like me are familiar with many cases in which an abortion was the right decision for a patient. We care for patients whose pregnancies put their lives at risk because they led to severe preeclampsia or threatened to damage vital organs. Some patients, early in a much-desired pregnancy, learn the fetus has a severe genetic abnormality that is incompatible with life, such as fetuses that develop without brains, hearts or lungs. We care for teens unprepared to have children and young women who were victims of rape.
But even those patients who aren’t facing these circumstances deserve to make their own decisions about what is best for their bodies, their lives and their futures.
All patients should have the freedom to decide what’s right for them. These Nevadans deserve the freedom to make their own medical choices without outside interference and politically motivated laws banning medical procedures such as abortions.
Since the overturning of Roe v. Wade by radical anti-abortion Supreme Court justices, citizens in states such as Nevada realize that we must do more to constitutionally protect our freedoms, especially our freedom to make life-and-death medical decisions.
Nevadans understand what’s at stake. Nevadans see how some states are clamping down on patients’ medical freedom, such as Idaho and Utah next door. Nevadans also see how some states are stepping up to protect patients, such as Michigan, Illinois and even Arizona, which will decide on its own citizens referendum to protect abortion access this November.
More than 6 in 10 Nevadans support the freedom to an abortion and a constitutional amendment to protect reproductive freedom.
By passing Question 6, we can ensure that patients can get an abortion if they choose and that politicians won’t be able to force patients to be pregnant. A yes vote establishes a permanent layer of protection so that no matter who holds office in our state, extreme abortion bans cannot become law in Nevada. A yes vote keeps families — not politicians — in charge of their own health care decisions, so that women can make these personal decisions in consultation with their doctors and those they love and trust.
Whatever their circumstances, patients deserve the freedom to make their own decisions about their health care, with trusted medical professionals in the room, not politicians and their extreme agendas.
Dr. Tiffany Sigal is an emergency room doctor.
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