After a legislative panel approved a measure that banned abortion pills went into play Feb. 5, women are no longer allowed to have access to the abortion pill. While I am pro-life, I do think that if women are going to terminate their pregnancies, it should happen at the earliest stage possible. The abortion pill should not be taken away.

Banning abortion has been tested in the past, and women would most likely go back to the way they did things before it was legalized for doctors. They tried to do it themselves. When it comes to the level of danger for the mother, I would think that a pill would be safer than a woman attempting to abort a child without a doctor.

The abortion pill gives women the option to terminate pregnancy at an early stage. The way that it has been decided in past circumstances is by a video chat with doctors to decide whether or not the pill form of abortion is right for that specific woman. Making the decision to end a life should take more than just a video chat with your doctor. If you are planning on having an abortion, you should have to take the drive to see a doctor.

It was suggested that doing the videos with the doctor to make this tough decision would be easier in Iowa because there are so many towns and farms that are too far out in the country to be able to come in to make a doctor’s appointment. Personally, I do not think that if you are going to abort a child you should be able to make that decision via video. If you cannot make the trip in to see a doctor, you cannot terminate the pregnancy.

Once in the doctor’s office, deciding to end the pregnancy at an early stage with a pill sounds like it would be better than waiting for the baby to be further along. A fetus can feel pain at twenty-three weeks, so the pill form abortion would mean terminating a pregnancy before fetus would feel any pain.

The determining factor in deciding against the pill was that it would give women a longer time to decide if they wanted to keep the baby. In a story from the Des Moines Register, Dr. Windschitl said, “I’m not trying to take away a right that the Supreme Court found in 1973. There’s no way that you can fully legislate away abortion, and I fully respect that. It’s about changing hearts and minds.” Clearly, Dr. Windschitl is optimistic about women changing their minds when it comes to abortion, but what are the odds that these women actually will change their minds?

Chances are that women who plan on having an abortion are not going to change their minds because they are starting to show signs of pregnancy physically. For some women, actually seeing their body change may change their mind and make them feel more compelled to keep the baby, but it is also a possibility that it will make women want to get an abortion more and they may look for alternative, unhealthy ways to abort the child.

A fetus is a life. Although a mother has not birthed it yet, it is still a human and should be treated as such. If a mother is going to choose to abort her child, it is safer for both the mother and the baby to do it at an early stage in the pregnancy. If women are considering abortion, they should get into the doctor’s office to get a second opinion.

If I were to get an abortion a simple video chat with my doctor would not be enough to make a decision. It is understandable that not everyone has access to a doctor’s office, but we are not talking about getting rid of the common cold with some medicine sent after a video chat. We are talking about deciding whether or not to take a life.