Texas’ maternal mortality rate rose dramatically after abortion ban, study finds – National & International News – MON 23Sep2024

Texas’ maternal mortality rate rose dramatically after abortion ban, study finds.

Trump says will not run again if he loses in November.

Israeli strikes kill over 270 in Lebanon on Monday.

NATIONAL NEWS

Study finds Texas’ maternal mortality rate rose dramatically after abortion ban

A report from the Gender Equity Policy Institute has found that Texas’s maternal mortality rate rose by 56% between 2019 and 2022. This is dramatically higher than a slower 11% Nationwide rise during that same time period. The spike the state’s ban on abortion care in 2021. 

Although Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, Texas passed SB 8, known as the Heartbeat Act, nearly a full year before the supreme Court’s Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health decision. After this point, GEPI noted a rise in deaths among mothers, either during pregnancy, during labor or shortly after childbirth.

Nancy L. Cohen, president of GEPI, says, “There’s only one explanation for the staggering difference in maternal mortality. All the research points to Texas’s abortion ban as the primary driver of this alarming increase.”

Just last week, investigative reporting outlet ProPublica, published the stories of two Georgia women, Amber Thurman and Candi Miller, who died in 2022. Following a state commission inquiry, these women were the first named cases of maternal deaths directly attributable to state-level abortion restrictions.

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Trump says he will not run again if he loses in November 

In an interview with Sinclair broadcasting group on Sunday, host Sharyl Attkisson asked former president Trump if he intended to run for president again if he loses this November. 

“No I don’t. No I don’t. I don’t see that at all. I think that, hopefully, we are going to be successful,” Trump said, alluding to his chances of winning re-election in November. 

Trump, now 78, would be 82 at the time of the 2028 election. Just in the past 2 months, he has narrowly escaped two assassination attempts. Moreover, if he does not win in November, the Federal prosecutions against him would move ahead and, if he is still living in 2028, he may be in federal prison. This would not necessarily prevent him from mounting a fourth presidential campaign, but it would be a severe disadvantage.

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INTERNATIONAL NEWS

Israeli strikes kill over 270 in Lebanon on Monday 

Following an attack orchestrated by Israel last week in Lebanon, which caused thousands of pagers and walkie talkies to explode, 11 months of cross border exchanges of rocket fire have continued to intensify. Today, Israel announced that it had carried out over 300 strikes in Lebanon. Lebanese health ministry officials say that these strikes killed at least 270 people and wounded over 1,000 others. This included at least 21 children and 31 women as well as civilian medical personnel. 

This would be the deadliest day in Lebanon attributable to Israeli action since hostilities resumed in October of last year.

Lebanese militant group Hezbollah also fired dozens of rockets add an Israeli military post and continued its attacks on the headquarters of Rafael, a private Israeli military defense contractor, located in Haifa.

While many commentators have pointed to a fear that Israel and Lebanon may soon be in a state of war, from the perspective of the combatants, this appears to already be the case. Last week’s pager attack, which UN watchdogs immediately denounced as a war crime, was declared by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah to be an “act of war” by Israel against the Lebanese people.

Meanwhile in Gaza

Israeli airstrikes against civilian targets in Gaza continue to claim dozens of lives each day. Now, Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is considering a plan that would only deepen the horror. The plan, conceived by retired military commanders, calls for declaring Northern Gaza a “closed military zone“. 

This would entail forcing the 300,000 to 500,000 Palestinians still in the area (most of whom are already displaced) to travel to the south. The justification offered for this is that anyone left in Northern Gaza would be considered to be and treated as a combatant. Supposedly this would force Hamas to release any remaining hostages in those areas. However, what it would actually amount to is Israel giving itself carte blanche to carry out further and more deadly indiscriminate attacks against civilians. 

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civilians already fled the area months ago. They traveled, mostly on foot, along what Israel labeled as “humanitarian corridors”. Nevertheless, the evacuees were nevertheless targeted by bombings and snipers. Many stayed behind, either because they could not leave for one reason or another, or because they did not trust Israel’s promise of safety in the south. Considering that Israel has repeatedly targeted areas it has designated as “safe zones” – including massive tent encampments, UN facilities, and schools and hospitals being used as shelters – that mistrust would seem to be well founded. 

Another “voluntary” mass exodus from northern Gaza, such as the one that took place nearly 10 months ago, is unlikely. It is already nigh impossible to get humanitarian supplies into Northern Gaza. By declaring it a closed military zone, Israel would cut off all humanitarian access. This would be an egregious violation of the Geneva Convention.