https://abcnews.go.com/US/texas-abortion-law-means-woman-continue-pregnancy-despite/story?id=97918340Kylie Beaton was looking forward to having her second child later this year. Now, she's faced with carrying an unviable pregnancy to its end due to Texas' highly restrictive abortion ban.
According to a report from her doctor, Beaton's baby has a rare, severe condition impacting the development of its brain, but she is unable to access abortion care in her home state.
"To have a woman go through so much torture along the way that's going to stay with them forever," Beaton told ABC News. "Whatever the case may be, you have to look at things from a different perspective."
At her 20-week ultrasound appointment, Beaton said her physician discovered the fetus had a rare, severe anomaly in which the fetus's brain does not develop into two hemispheres as it normally would, and the major structures of the brain remain fused in the middle.
The brain splitting into two hemispheres is a "critical stage in the development" and can impact the development of the nose, mouth and throat, Dr. Katie McHugh, an Indiana OB-GYN and abortion provider, told ABC News. The condition can result in a very painful life and death for the fetus, McHugh said.
"Often times we will offer, if not recommend, pregnancy termination," McHugh said.
The anomaly occurs in about 1 in 250 fetuses, but in just 1 in 16,000 live births, according to the Cleveland Clinic. Beaton's 28-week ultrasound shows the severity of her baby's anomaly.
Beaton said her physicians told her the baby could survive out of the womb for a couple of weeks, at most, in the event that the pregnancy ends in a live birth. Rouse agreed with this assessment, pointing to what she said is a lack of development of normal brain tissue and empty fluid filling the head.
