The show of women in the US jailed for having a miscarriage

When an Oklahoma Indian woman was convicted of manslaughter after suffering an abortion, people were outraged. But her case was not unique, Brittney Poolaw was four months pregnant when she sadly lost her baby in the hospital in January 2020.

In October of this year, she was sentenced to four years in prison for the first-degree murder of her unborn baby.

How she went from suffering the loss of her fetus to being sentenced for killing her baby has become a subject of much debate.

Some pointed out on social media that his conviction coincided with Pregnancy Loss Awareness Month in America. Other people contrasted the case with Margaret Atwood's dystopian novel The Handmaid's Tale.

The Brittney Poolaw Case

When she arrived at the hospital for help, Poolaw admitted to using illicit drugs during her pregnancy. Later, the coroner's report found traces of methamphetamine in the liver and brain of her fetus.

The coroner did not verify the cause of death of the fetus and pointed out that a genetic abnormality, an abruption of the placenta or the use of methamphetamine by the mother could have been contributing factors in the death.

Poolaw's attorneys say they will appeal the sentence. The prosecutor who took his case to court has declined to comment while the process continues.

But Poolaw's story is just the tip of the iceberg, says Dana Sussman, deputy executive director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women (NAPW), a choice advocacy group.

The organization is assisting with Poolaw's appeal and has been tracking arrests and "forced intervention" cases against pregnant women in the United States.

Between 1973 and 2020, NAPW has recorded 1,600 such cases. About 1,200 occurred in the last 15 years alone.

Although some referred to women who were detained after falling or giving birth at home, the vast majority had to do with drugs and women of color were overrepresented.

The recent explosion in criminal cases is part of a "uniquely American phenomenon" at the crossroads of America's "war on drugs" and the Personhood [anti-abortion] movement, Sussman said.

When did this start?

The issue of the manifestation of the fetus to drugs came to the fore in the cultural debate in the 1980s, when the term "crack baby" began to be used to refer to children born to addicted mothers.

Studies from the 1980s confirmed that the children of mothers with cocaine addiction suffered from extreme developmental defects were later denigrated.

Since then, subsequent drug epidemics, from methamphetamine use to the opioid crisis, have kept the issue on the limelight.

At the same time, several states in the United States have passed laws that make abortion difficult. Although people oppose abortion for various reasons, be they moral or religious, part of the argument has centered on the notion of person.

"The concept of person is pretty straightforward," says Sarah Quale, president of the Personhood Alliance Education, a pro-life organization.

"We are human, and our equality is based on our humanity. Nothing changes the scientific fact that we are biologically human from beginning to end. Therefore, as human beings we deserve the same protection under the law because we have the same rights."

The Personhood movement has helped promote laws that go beyond the regulation of access to abortion to expand the rights and protections of the fetus as if it were a citizen of the State by birth.

Personhood Alliance Education also rejects issues such as medically witnessed death, research that destroys embryos, and human trafficking.

Although the organization does not take a position on whether the law should prosecute mothers who use drugs, Quale said he personally supports measures that "protect unborn children from the harm that occurs when a mother uses drugs during pregnancy."

"But our legal system must not only consider questions of responsibility and accountability, but also focus on the restoration and recovery of drug addicts", he added.

Laws that ensure or harm?

Substance use during pregnancy is considered child abuse under government assistance standards for ordinary children in 23 states, as indicated by the Guttmacher Institute, a research focus favorable to the decision.

In part of the US states, medical services workers are required to report suspected drug use by pregnant women.

In 2006, the province of Alabama passed a "compound hazard" law that made it a crime for a youth to "come forward, swallow, breathe, or come in contact with a controlled substance, synthetic substance, or medication."

An examination by ProPublica found that more than 500 women were charged in the decade since the law was passed. Tennessee, meanwhile, tried to do the same and passed a comparable law in 2014, however it ended two years after the fact and was not reloaded.

In one area of California, two women were jailed for giving birth to dead children and testing positive for illegal drugs.

The murder charges against Chelsea Becker were dropped for this year, after she spent eighteen months in prison after failing to post a $2 million bonds.

Meanwhile, Adora Pérez has been serving 33% of an 11-year sentence for mandatory murder after she confessed to stay away from the murder charge.

Both women were prosecuted under what are known as "fetal assault laws," which exist in at least 38 states.

These laws are intended to help punish abusers who harm pregnant women, many of them prompted by a 2004 federal law passed after the murder of Laci Peterson, who was pregnant, and was killed at the hands of her husband.

But many of these laws are ambiguous, leaving the door open for prosecutors to charge women whose behavior may have contributed to the abortion or death of the fetus.

Some states have explicit rules about how many weeks a fetus must be viable; others don't. Most doctors place viability around 20-24 weeks.