A roundup of some of the most popular but completely untrue stories and visuals of the week. None of these are legit, even though they were shared widely on social media. The Associated Press checked them out. Here are the facts:
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Claim: Abortion is never medically necessary to protect the health of the mother.
The facts: Doctors say there are multiple situations in which abortion is medically necessary to save the life of the pregnant mother. The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last month to end constitutional protections for abortion has reinvigorated misinformation about what constitutes an abortion and whether the procedure can be medically necessary.
“Abortion is never medically necessary to save the life of the mother,” read a widely shared Facebook post from an anti-abortion nonprofit. “There are maternal health emergencies that require the mother and child to be separated through natural delivery, c-section, or the removal of a child in an ectopic pregnancy situation,” another widely shared post read. “And sometimes the child is sadly too young to survive. But this is not an abortion because every effort is made by doctors to preserve the lives of BOTH patients — mother & child.”
But doctors told the AP that there are many circumstances in which abortion — meaning the termination of a pregnancy — can be medically necessary.
“Without question, abortion can be medically necessary,” The American College...
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